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FAMOUS ACTORS OF THE DAY 

IN AMERICA 



Stage Lovers' Series 

Famous Actresses of the Day in 
America* First Series 

Famous Actresses of the Day in 
America* Second Series 

Prima Donnas and Soubrettes of Light 
Opera and Musical Comedy in 
America 

Famous Actors of the Day in America* 

First Series 

Famous Actors of the Day in America* 

Second Series 

Celebrated Comedians of Light Opera 

and Musical Comedy in America 
David Garrick and His Contemporaries 
The Kembles and Their Contemporaries 
Kean and Booth and Their Contempo- 
raries 
Macready and Forrest and Their Con- 
temporaries 
Edwin Booth and His Contemporaries 



L. C PAGE & COMPANY 

200 Summer Street, Boston, Mass* 

Publishers 




E H 5DTHERN 

- Yl L ELT. 



Famous Actors 
of the Day 

in America 

SE 

Lewis C. Strang 

ILLUSTRATED 






Famous Actors 
of the Day 

in America 

SECbND SER/ES * 

By 
Lewis C. Strang 

ILLUSTRATED 




Boston 
L. C. Page and Company 



(Incorporated) 
I Q02 

O J 



THE LIBRARY OF 

CONGRESS, 
Two Copies Recsiveo 

SEP. 14 1901 

^COPVfWOHT ENTWV 

Am *+. '*?c> 

CLASS CVXXC No. 
COPY A. 



Copyright, igoi 

By L. C. Page and Company 

(incorporated) 

All rights reserved 



ZZf* 
Off* 



Colonial ^ress 

Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. 

Boston, Mass., U.S.A. 



PREFACE. 

The Second Series of Famous Actors of 
the Day in America, has been planned to in- 
clude, in the form of biography and criticism, 
practically a complete history of the stage 
in this country during the seasons of 1899- 
1900 and 1 900- 1 90 1. In this volume, there- 
fore, only those players have been considered 
whose work has brought them into special 
prominence within the limited period indi- 
cated. The writer expects to be called to 
account for including in a work on the stage 
in the United States articles on John Hare 
and Edward S. Willard, and he desires to 
forestall adverse comment, by declaring 
frankly that he has no valid excuse for such 
unwarranted behaviour. He wished, solely 



vi Preface. 

as a matter of personal gratification, to write 
about these two Englishmen, both of whom 
are well known and much admired in this 
country. 

Lewis C. Strang. 



CONTENTS. 



HAPTER PAGE 

Preface v 

I. The New E. H. Sothern . . n 
II. John Drew in Comedy and Ro- 
mance 32 

III. N. C. GooDwm, the Comedian . 43 

IV. John B. Mason in Modern Com- 

edy 62 

V. Fritz Williams ... yj 

VI. William Gillette and " Sher- 
lock Holmes " . . . . .89 
VII. Edwin Arden . . . .108 
VIII. Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 116 
IX. William Faversham . . .137 
X. Stuart Robson in " Oliver 

Goldsmith" . . . .154 
XI. The Melodramatic James 

O'Neill 166 

XII. James A. Herne's "Sag Har- 
bour" 176 

XIII. Maclyn Arbuckle . . . 187 

vii 



Vlll 



Contents. 



CHAPTER 


PAGE 


XIV. 


John Hare . . . . .198 


XV. 


William H. Crane . . . 226 


XVI. 


Henry Miller in Melodrama . 235 


XVII. 


John Blair and the Independ- 




ent Theatre .... 253 


XVIII. 


Henry Jewett .... 280 


XIX. 


Edward S. Willard . . . 290 


XX. 


Louis Mann 309 


XXL 


Charles J. Richman . . .321 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGE 

E. H. Sothern as Hamlet IN " Hamlet." Frontispiece 
e. h. sothern as heinrich in " the sunken 

Bell" 14 

John Drew as Richard Carvel in " Richard 

Carvel" 32 

N. C. Goodwin as Richard Carewe in " When 

We Were Twenty-one" .... 43 
N. C. Goodwin as Shylock in "The Merchant 

of Venice" n 

John B. Mason 62 

Fritz Williams 77 

William Gillette as Sherlock Holmes in 

" Sherlock Holmes " 89 

Edwin Arden as Metternich in " L'Aiglon " 108 

Richard Mansfield 116 

Richard Mansfield as Henry V. in " King 

Henry V." 132 

William Faversham as Lord Algy, with 

Joseph Wheelock, Jr., as Morley, in 

"Lord and Lady Algy" . . . .137 
William Faversham as Lieut. John Hinds 

in "Brother Officers" .... 144 



List of Illustrations, 

PAGE 

Stuart Robson as Oliver Goldsmith in 

" Oliver Goldsmith " 154 

James O'Neill as Edmond Dantes in " Monte 

Cristo " 166 

James A. Herne as Capt. Dan Marble in 

" Sag Harbour" 176 

Maclyn Arbuckle . . . . . .187 

John Hare 198 

William H. Crane as David Harum in 

" David Harum " 226 

Henry Miller as Sydney Carton in "The 

Only Way" 235 

John Blair 253 

Henry Jewett as David McFarland in " The 

Greatest Thing in the World" . . 280 
Edward S. Willard as Tom Pinch in " Tom 

Pinch" 290 

Louis Mann as Franz Hochstuhl in " All 

on Account of Eliza " 309 

Charles J. Richman 321 



FAMOUS ACTORS OF THE DAY 

IN AMERICA 



CHAPTER I. 

THE NEW E. H. SOTHERN. 

If I had been asked before the evening of 
December 22, 1899, to give a concise esti- 
mate of the professional standing of Edward 
H. Sothern, I should have written something 
like this : Mr. Sothern is a man of intelli- 
gence, an actor of worthy ambition and of 
laudable purpose. He has climbed steadily- 
upward from the minor beginnings of " The 
Highest Bidder," to the major achievements 
of "The Prisoner of Zenda." He has ac- 
complished this much with dignity and with- 
out undue "booming. ,, His reputation has 



12 Famous Actors. 

been honestly won and is thoroughly de- 
served. In spite of a number of unfortunate 
and apparently settled mannerisms, and an 
obvious lack of sweeping breadth of style, 
he is a comedian of unusual finesse, of much 
subtil ty, of splendid sincerity, of great per- 
sonal charm, and a romantic actor of grace, 
virility, and conviction. 

On December 22, 1899, that estimate of 
Mr. Sothern was fair and reasonable; after 
December 2 2d, however, it was valueless. 
For on that evening, when " The Sunken 
Bell/' Charles Henry Meltzer's English 
version of Gerhart Hauptmann's strange 
German play, " Die Versunkene Glocke," was 
produced at the Hollis Street Theatre in 
Boston, a new E. H. Sothern came into 
being in the personality of Heinrich, the bell- 
founder. It was not that the personation 
itself, even when judged in the kindliest 
spirit, could be termed undeniably great, — 
that it was distinctly excellent is a more faith- 



The New E. H. Sot/tern-. 13 

f ul characterisation ; the great astonishment 
came from the fact that Mr. Sothern was the 
personator. Whereas, previous to this daring 
experiment, the public was fairly settled in 
the belief that this gracious actor was des- 
tined to portray, in the future as in the past, 
the inconsequential swashbucklers of romance 
and the entertaining gentlemen of modern 
comedy, on that occasion this same com- 
placent public suddenly and unmistakably 
realised that there were strange and un- 
reckoned possibilities in the man. When, in 
the fall of 1900, Mr. Sothern made public a 
Hamlet of more than merely praiseworthy 
efficiency, these possibilities became actuali- 
ties. The new Mr. Sothern was an estab- 
lished fact. I, for one, am content to hand 
over his future into his own keeping. I 
make no prophecies. 

Mr. Sothern began his season, in the fall 
of 1899, with a brassy, spectacular melo- 
drama, called "The Song of the Sword." It 



14 Famous Actors. 

was by Leo Ditrichstein, and was no worse, 
perhaps, — surely no better, — than half a 
dozen others of the same violent class. It 
had the virtue of a good last act, in which, 
however, Mr. Sothern himself was practically 
non-existent, all the honours going to Virginia 
Harned and to Morton Selten, who gave a 
very effective character study of Prince Otto 
Louis. 

In whatever light one regards " The Sunken 
Bell/' — whether simply as a poetic fairy tale 
or, more understandingly, as a puzzling alle- 
gory, — its greatness as a work of highly 
imaginative art must be conceded. Taken 
as a dramatic allegory, one may read in it 
almost any meaning that his mind and his 
heart dictate. There is Heinrich, the master 
bell-founder, dreamer and idealist. His 
proudest achievement is a bell of such per- 
fection of tone as man has never before 
heard. He plans to set it high up in the 
mountains, among the peaks, for all the world 




E. H. SOTHERN 

As Heinrich in " The Sunken Bell." 



The New E. H. Sotkern. 15 

to hear. Alas, for human ambition ! The 
marvellous result of his art and skill is sent 
by the jealous mountain spirits rolling, tum- 
bling, clanging from the heights, finally to be 
lost beyond reclaim in the deep waters of 
the lake. 

There is Rautendelein, that strange and 
wonderful conception of the eternal feminine, 
that living, free creature with control over 
all the wild, weird inhabitants of the moun- 
tain. They all love her, some with amorous 
passion like the wood-sprite, some with jeal- 
ous selfishness, like the Nicklemann. But 
she cares for none of them. She is thought- 
lessly happy, until Heinrich, borne down by 
bitter fatigue, seeking ever his lost bell, 
suddenly comes upon her. She loves him, 
and as proof of her love magically heals his 
hurts, wondrously fills his soul with fresh 
strength and youthful vigour, and willingly 
leads him to the heights, fit and ready for 
mighty deeds. 



1 6 Famous Actors. 

Ah, but he has wife and children, neigh- 
bours and friends, this Heinrich ; and al- 
though he can feel surging within him lofty 
and enduring purposes, a splendid capacity 
for great things, he cannot wholly forget 
those whom he has left below. Still, the 
arguments of the pious, narrow-minded vicar, 
who comes to Heinrich in his retreat, cannot 
turn the bell-founder from Rautendelein, nor 
from his new labours. Yet the visit troubles 
him, makes him harsh and irritable, disturbed 
and fearful. Neither can the brute force of 
his neighbours, who would carry him away, 
even kill him, change his resolution. Then 
come his two little sons, and stern purpose is 
weakened. Former ambitions and ideas 
crowd in upon him. He hears the pealing 
voice of the sunken bell. At last he is 
conquered. He drives Rautendelein from 
him, and turns back to the old life. 

The end ? Simply the inevitable, the fated 
destiny of all, who, having found the light, 



The New E. H. Sothem. 17 

try vainly again to live in the darkness. 
Heinrich is not long in perceiving that, after 
the glories of the heights, he can never read- 
just himself to the minor things of the valley. 
Wearily he climbs upward again, searching 
for his Rautendelein. It is too late. She, 
despairing, has been claimed by the Nickle- 
mann. Life, after this, holds nothing for the 
heart-broken Heinrich, and he dies gladly. 
But as he dies there shines upon him — mar- 
vellous comforter — the bright sun of promise 
and cheer. For, is it not true, those who 
have once attained the heights, even if 
only to fall from them, are infinitely more 
worthy than those who have never striven at 
all? 

Three moments in " The Sunken Bell " 
stand forth over all others in stage effective- 
ness. They are the climaxes of the second, 
third, and fourth acts. The second act of the 
drama shows the final enthrallment of Hein- 
rich by Rautendelein. This elfish creature, 



1 8 Famous Actors. 

loving with pure freedom and frankness the 
mortal Heinrich, whom she has found near 
her fountain home crushed beneath his mis- 
fortunes, gains access, in the disguise of a 
village maiden, to the house wherein Hein- 
rich lies sick unto death. Left alone to care 
for him, she heals him by her magic arts, 
sends the blood coursing through his veins 
with renewed vigour, and by her kiss reveals 
to him world wonders of which he has never 
even dreamed. 

While he is rejoicing in his newly acquired 
strength, while he is proclaiming his freedom, 
his wife enters. She is amazed and delighted 
at the change in her husband, and flies to his 
arms ; but his eyes are fixed, not on Magda, 
but on the alluring Rautendelein, who, her 
face shining with uncanny radiance, beckons 
him to the heights above where is her home. 
The lighting of this scene in the Sothern 
production was superb, and under an almost 
ghastly brilliancy the features of Rautendelein 



The New E. H. So them. 19 

stood out with a gleam that of itself suggested 
the supernatural. 

The climax of the third act brings one also 
to the climax of the play. Heinrich is in his 
mountain retreat, masterful and self-confident. 
He is busy with his great work, unassailed 
by doubt and without fear of the future. The 
vicar, good and sympathetic, even if narrow 
in his outlook on life, seeks the bell-founder 
and recalls him to wife, to children, and to 
old friends. But Heinrich is steadfast to his 
new ideal. He answers the vicar, argument 
for argument, until at last the good man, his 
patience well-nigh exhausted, touches the 
weak point in Heinrich's armour, the clinging 
influence of the old ideas, an influence never 
wholly eradicated. " The lost bell shall ring 
again ! Then think of me ! " exclaims the 
vicar. From this moment Heinrich feels ap- 
prehension and the loss of faith in himself 
closing in upon him. 

The end of the fourth act shows the com- 



20 Famous Actors. 

plete subordination (for the time being) of 
Heinrich to his weakness. It is a condition 
reached gradually. At first he is irritable 
and vexed over his work, and he abuses the 
gnomes, his helpers. When he sleeps, doubt 
and terror overpower him, and for a time not 
even Rautendelein can calm him. In the 
exultation of hand to hand conflict with the 
, villagers, he temporarily regains his bold- 
ness of spirit, but the sight of his two little 
sons, bearing an urn full of their mother's 
tears, undoes him completely. 

Then the bell tolls ! And how its ominous 
crashings reverberate ! They make one 
shiver. " The bell ! " cries Heinrich, — then 
to Rautendelein : " Back, lest I strike thee ! 
I come ! " he shouts, and not heeding Rau- 
tendelein' s " Stay, Heinrich, stay ! " he tears 
himself from her and rushes down the moun- 
tainside. " Lost, lost for aye ! " is Rauten- 
delein' s lament, and through it all the bell, 
the pitiless bell, booms unceasingly. 



The New E. H. Sothern. 21 

We Anglo-Saxons — to adopt Mr. Dooley's 
classification — are a prosaic-minded folk. 
We do not people our woods and our moun- 
tains with sprites and elves and gnomes ; we 
have no water-spirits and no fairies. We, in 
our superior way, laugh at all these things 
as childish fancies, wholly unworthy the 
attention of serious grown-ups. Once in 
a century, possibly, the masterful imagina- 
tion of a Washington Irving will force his 
mystic creations on us, and we are almost 
deluded into believing that the thunder peals, 
rolling and echoing through the Catskills, are 
really the sounds made by Hendrick Hud- 
son's weird sailors playing at tenpins. But 
Washington Irvings have not been common 
enough to have made any general impression 
on the race tendency toward unpoetic skepti- 
cism. Therefore, Hauptmann's drama, which, 
without any warning to many of the individu- 
als in the average audience, plunged imme- 
diately into the atmosphere of a Hans 



22 Famotis Actors. 

Andersen fairy tale, left in its wake, as it 
journeyed through the country, mystery 
and puzzled bewilderment. Waterman and 
wood-sprite, queer little white-bearded 
gnomes, beautiful fairies, and, more than 
all else, the indefinable Rautendelein, proved 
strange, inexplicable and foolish things. Still, 
popular approval of Mr. Sothern's produc- 
tion was not wholly lacking, for the beauty 
of the scenery appealed to those who were 
untouched by the beauty of the play. 

In spite of the fact that Mr. Sothern fell 
far short of realising in full the possibilities 
of Heinrich, his portrayal of the difficult char- 
acter was unquestionably the most serious 
and the most worthy work that he had done 
up to that time. He clung close to the earth 
throughout, but he succeeded marvellously 
well in all passages that required force and 
power. With the simple poetry he was far 
less successful. His reading of the lines — 
his elocution — was certainly poor, judged 



The New E. H. Sothern. 23 

by any ordinary standard, but on this point, 
if one but remembered Mr. Sothern's com- 
mon trick of cutting his speeches into lengths, 
which he snapped out with the explosiveness 
of a whip-crack, he could the better appre- 
ciate how much attention the actor must 
have given to his speech in preparing for 
"The Sunken Bell. ,, 

The Sothern Hamlet was first shown in 
New York on September 17, 1900, and 
when one perceived the actor's astounding 
advance as a serious actor in the few months 
that had elapsed since his first performance 
of "The Sunken Bell, ,, one could do no less 
than accord him the tribute of both amaze- 
ment and wonder. Mr. Sothern's Heinrich, 
as a sustained effort, was not at all as meri- 
torious as his Hamlet. He acted Heinrich 
in flashes ; his Hamlet, on the contrary, 
never fell to decided mediocrity, and more 
than once it whirled into passion and power. 
Mr. Sothern's chief technical fault was still 



24 Famous Actors. 

his reading, but even this was far from bad. 
Certainly he never read any lines with a 
general excellence that approached his read- 
ing of Hamlet. 

The acting version of " Hamlet " used by 
Mr. Sothern divided the play into five acts 
and twelve scenes. Five of these scenes 
were in the first act, which closely followed 
the book. Act II. passed wholly in a room 
of state in the castle, and ended, of course, 
with the familiar business of Hamlet's com- 
position of the lines for the play. The first 
scene of the third act took one through the 
play, and " Tis now the very witching time 
of night " soliloquy. The scene in the 
queen's closet followed. Act IV. left Ham- 
let out entirely, and was occupied with 
the madness and death of Ophelia, and the 
return of the fiery and revengeful Laertes. 
The first scene of Act V. showed the church- 
yard ; the second scene a balcony of the 
castle, where the summons for the treacher- 



The New E. H. So them. 25 

ous fencing match with Laertes was re- 
ceived; the third and final scene depicted 
the tragic denouement. 

Only two unusual omissions were noticed, 
— the first surprising, but by no means un- 
warranted, in a case where the saving of 
time was so important. This was Polonius's 
long speech of advice and farewell to Laertes 
on the latter' s departure for France. The 
second omission was both surprising and, 
according to my view, unwarranted. Mr. 
Sothern erased completely the scene wherein 
Hamlet finds Claudius, the king, at prayer, 
and starts impulsively forward to kill him, 
then hesitates, and finally excuses himself 
from the deed by declaring that he will not 
send the murderer's soul to heaven by cut- 
ting him down while he is at prayer. Not 
only is this scene an extremely effective one 
theatrically, but it is ordinarily regarded as 
an important one in the exposition of Ham- 
let's character. 



26 Famous Actors. 

Regarding the scenery and general setting 
of the play, it would be churlish not to accord 
the highest praise, for everywhere was in 
evidence a high ideal, artistic purpose, and 
excellent taste. Personally I should have 
enjoyed a trifle less elaborateness and a trifle 
more speed. 

Without argument, one took the Sothern 
Hamlet seriously, which in itself was a great 
compliment to the actor's work. One felt 
instinctively that Mr. Sothern was labouring 
enthusiastically, intellectually, and honestly 
to realise an ideal that had been fixed high 
enough to demand from him the most strenu- 
ous and the most constant effort, and to earn 
for him the fullest encouragement and the 
most helpful cooperation. Of the many 
diverse personalities that voiced their opinions 
of Mr. Sothern's Dane, not one had the bad 
taste to treat his personation in a flippant or 
depressing manner. Indeed, the tendency 
was to overpraise rather than to undervalue, 



The New E. H. Sothern. 2 J 

with the consequent danger of causing the 
recipient of this pleasant approbation to rest 
too contentedly satisfied with those laurels 
already his. 

Considered merely as an exhibition of 
acting, the shortcomings of Mr. Sothern's 
Hamlet were minor and unimportant, — 
faults that continued practice and increased 
facility would, to a large extent, remedy. 
But Hamlet, it should be remembered, is far 
more than a study in acting. Hamlet is the 
most complete, and consequently the most 
complexed and most puzzling, character in 
imaginative literature. Hamlet is a man, and 
until an actor has embodied this humanity, 
until he has sufficiently mastered to make 
them perceptible to others, the extreme sub- 
tilties of character and of motive which, 
working one on another, result in the strange 
creature of hesitancy and inaction that Shake- 
speare drew, he can scarcely be said to have 
more than hinted at a possible Hamlet. Mr. 



28 Famous Actors. 

Sothern's conception was still in shreds. He 
believed that Hamlet was sane and that he 
was naturally light-hearted, tender-spirited, 
and lovable, that his mind bristled with in- 
tellectual conceits, odd paradoxes, and sar- 
donic humours. Excellent were all these as 
trappings and decorations, but they by no 
means suggested an answer to the funda^ 
mental "why," which is the Hamlet enigma. 
One general statement covered Mr. Sottu 
era's impersonation most thoroughly. His 
Hamlet was decidedly a noteworthy perform- 
ance, considered in detail ; regarded as a 
whole, however, as a study and exposition of 
character, it was by no means wholly satis- 
factory. I could — anybody could — have 
picked flaws in Mr. Sothern's action from 
scene to scene, and these flaws were mainly 
to be found in his reading of the lines. 
Nevertheless, the Sothern Hamlet from scene 
to scene was powerful acting. Sothern, too, 
had done wonders in reading during the year, 



The New E. H. Sot hern. 29 

— this whilom comedian with the halting, 
gasping speech, — but he had not yet gained 
full control of his vocal machinery, nor fixed 
absolutely in many instances on the proper 
words to be emphasised in his speeches. 
Sothern' s whirlwind of speech several times 
resolved itself into a meaningless mess. But 
these lapses were very much the exception. 
Generally Mr. Sothern read with understand- 
ing, force, and poetic charm, and at the same 
time he maintained a fairly rapid tempo 
without exasperating or sentimental drag- 
giness. 

In pantomime, Mr. Sothern was notably 
good. He was satisfied with comparatively 
few introductions of new business. The 
scene of the first meeting with the ghost, 
especially Hamlet's fierce command to his 
friend to unhand him, was genuinely thrilling. 
The "To be or not to be" soliloquy was 
given remarkably well, and the parting with 
Ophelia immediately after, was presented in 



30 Famous Actors. 

a fashion both intelligent and interpretative. 
The interview with the Queen was pitched, 
perhaps, on too high a key. The business in 
the duel scene of the last act was ingeniously 
and naturally managed. The King's death 
was contrived in the midst of a moving frenzy, 
and Hamlet's final moments were impressive. 
In all the scenes where Hamlet's sarcastic 
humour and satirical wit found play, Mr. 
Sothern was very effective, while his passion- 
ate moments passed always without a sug- 
gestion of weakness. The final tragedy was 
accomplished, if not with tremendous force, 
at least with a pathetic power that was not 
to be denied. 

In detail, then, Mr. Sothern's Hamlet 
earned honestly warm praise and generous 
admiration. What it lacked, however, was 
personality. What manner of man was this 
Hamlet ? Why was it that he talked so 
much about killing the King, later seemed to 
forget all about his necessary revenge, and 



The New E. H. Sot hern. 31 

at last only accomplished his purpose by the 
merest chance ? I confess that I could not 
answer these direct questions after seeing 
Mr. Sothern's performance. Mr. Sothern 
has to a degree mastered the technical diffi- 
culties in the presentation of Shakespeare's 
great character. It still remains for him to 
portray Hamlet as a man, as a human being, 
a task that will demand all his sympathy, 
understanding, instinct, and knowledge of 
human nature. 



CHAPTER II. 

JOHN DREW IN COMEDY AND ROMANCE. 

Haddon Chambers's comedy, "The Tyr- 
anny of Tears," which was presented in this 
country during the season of 1 899-1 900 by 
John Drew, was originally acted at the Crite- 
rion Theatre, London, on April 6, 1899, w ^h 
Charles Wyndham as Mr. Parbury. In the 
summing up of the dramatic record of 1899, 
the play was pronounced by a number of the 
London critics as the best of the year, next 
to Arthur W. Pinero's " The Gay Lord 
Quex." It is true that "The Tyranny of 
Tears " was by no means as brilliant a speci- 
men of dramatic construction as "The Gay 
Lord Quex," and because of this positive 
brilliancy " The Gay Lord Quex " will un- 
3 2 




JOHN DREW 
As Richard Carvel in " Richard Carvel.' 



John Drezv in Comedy and Romance. 33 

doubtedly outlive "The Tyranny of Tears." 
Nevertheless, Mr. Chambers's play had one 
great merit that the Pinero play did not 
possess: "The Tyranny of Tears" was 
thoroughly real. 

Those whose ideal of dramatic art is abso- 
lute sincerity and artistic fidelity to truth 
found much to admire in "The Tyranny of 
Tears." Still, if one were disposed to find 
fault with the play, he could reasonably do 
so on the score of over emphasis for the pur- 
poses of stage effect. Particularly was this 
true of the character of Mrs. Parbury, the 
tearful wife, whose domineering selfishness 
was carried too much to extremes to be thor- 
oughly trustworthy. However, this fault 
and one or two others of a similar nature 
were, comparatively speaking, minor mat- 
ters, for the play, as a whole, was strongly 
realistic. Its theme or its problem was 
an easily understood, and by no means 
rare, social condition, a condition, too, that 



34 Famous Actors. 

was, in every light, fair prey for high class 
comedy. 

Mr. Chambers's treatment of his theme was 
to a considerable degree free from the usual 
conventionalities of the stage. He succeeded 
in presenting an easily recognised social prob- 
lem in an unusually natural and satisfying 
way. In dealing with his material he evinced 
honesty, and, as a reward, he secured con- 
vincing force that was really remarkable 
when one considered the comparative flimsi- 
ness of his general scheme and the telltale 
obviousness of some of his construction. 
This obviousness of construction was a seri- 
ous blemish. In his desire to be perfectly 
clear, he was given to explaining too much 
and to preparing the way too carefully. I 
recall, for example, the obtrusive dusting 
of Parbury's photograph by Miss Hyacinth 
Woodward in the first act. Of course, that 
was a preliminary move to her kissing the 
picture in the second act. But the first 



John Drew in Comedy and Romance. 35 

action, as introduced by the dramatist, struck 
one as unnecessary, and therefore as in- 
artistic. 

The theme of Mr. Chambers's drama was 
domestic selfishness, — in this particular case 
on the part of the wife, a personally attract- 
ive woman, who loved her husband devotedly, 
and who in turn was devotedly loved by him. 
But she was immensely fond of having her 
own way, and her method of getting it was 
to weep softly into her lace embroidered 
handkerchief and sobbingly to inform the 
tender-hearted, easy-going husband that he 
no longer cared for her. He could not bear 
to see her cry, and he therefore always suc- 
cumbed to her will with repentant grace. 
Gradually his " before - marriage " friends 
ceased to visit him. He was no longer a 
frequenter of his club. Even the privacy 
of his working hours — for the poor fellow 
was an author and had no down-town office 
to which he could flee — was disregarded. 



36 Famous Actors. 

The pleasing young woman who acted as his 
private secretary and amanuensis, and whose 
tacit sympathy Parbury found an uncon- 
scious support and stimulus, alone perceived 
his position, and pitied him, much as one 
would pity a misunderstood and unhappy 
child. It was this pity which led her in 
a moment of abstraction to kiss her em- 
ployer's photograph. Unfortunately, the wife 
saw the act, naturally enough became angry, 
and told the girl that she must leave the 
house. The secretary, however, refused to 
take her dismissal from the wife, and the 
man, knowing nothing of the kiss, — for the 
wife, in her self-sufficient knowledge of male 
human nature, feared that the truth would 
prove disastrous flattery, — refused to part 
with his assistant. " Either she must go, or 
I will," declared the wife in the midst of her 
customary shower of tears. " She stays," 
insisted the husband. Thus the die was 
cast. The episode of the kiss was forgotten, 



John Drezv in Comedy and Romance. 37 

and it became a pitched battle for domestic 
mastery between the husband and the wife. 
The conclusion — and properly so in this 
particular case — was the rout, foot, horse, 
and dragoons, of the wife. 

With a background so genuinely meritori- 
ous, Mr. Chambers needed only to provide 
characters that reflected life, in order to place 
his drama on an artistic plane perceptibly 
higher than that occupied by the average 
modern comedy, and character drawing 
proved to be Mr. Chambers's strongest 
point. He peopled his play with human 
beings, each one of them an individual, and 
not one of them wholly divorced from human 
fellowship. There were only five personages, 
but every one was worth while. In his pres- 
entation of Mr. Parbury, Mr. Drew was in 
his best light comedy vein. His humour 
was abundant, and his occasional touches of 
pathos were delicate and free from mawk- 
ishness. It was not a part, however, that 



38 Famous Actors. 

tasked Mr. Drew's resources to any great 
extent, and it showed him in no new or 
strange light. This last accomplishment was 
left for the romantic " Richard Carvel.' ' 

Edward E. Rose dramatises a popular 
novel with all the enthusiasm and the skill 
of a small boy vigorously employing all the 
implements in his first chest of tools in the 
manufacture of a chicken-coop in the back- 
yard. If one could be quite sure that Mr. 
Rose took himself seriously in his perspiring 
attack on good sense and credulity, one might 
be disposed to scold a bit at an effort which 
expended itself as futilely as if one were 
blowing with a bellows against a healthy and 
wholly unconscious March wind. But the 
workmanship and effect of that which Mr. 
Rose so trustingly put forth as a play were 
so blatantly crude and palpably childish that 
one had to suspect, for the comfort of his 
own peace of mind, a coloured gentleman in 
the woodpile, possibly a good-natured joke on 



John Drew in Comedy and Romance. 39 

Mr. Rose's part, or a hidden jest or a subtle 
burlesque. 

At least so it seemed to be with his dram- 
atisation of Winston Churchill's " Richard 
Carvel," which John Drew presented during 
the season of 1 900-1 901. What could have 
been more deliriously funny, for example, 
than the climax of the third act, — the fierce 
clashing of swords by the dauntless Richard 
and the treacherous Duke of Chartersea, the 
nipping of the duke in his own trap, the 
onslaught of his riotous, drunken guests, 
the frantic flight of Richard up the stairs, 
arriving in desperate haste at the high win- 
dow just in time to catch the spot light just 
before the curtain went down ? 

That scene was Mr. Rose all over, — ma- 
chinery frankly oiled in full view of the spec- 
tators ; set in motion with all the flourishes 
of a trapeze performer in the circus, calling 
attention to an especially hazardous feat ; 
running its brief period with a clang and a 



40 Famous Actors. 

rattle and a bang that were substitutes for 
dramatic action, and ending with a rush 
hither and thither, and a spot-light climax ! 
In a word, then, " Richard Carvel " was 
a very ordinary melodrama, produced as if 
it were something different. Its merits were 
action and colour, and it interested one just as 
long as he refused to think. With the story 
as a whole, one had little or nothing to do. 
In fact, it is doubtful if one could have found 
a story as a whole if he had taken the trouble 
to search for it. There was a love-affair be- 
tween Richard and Dorothy Manners that 
lasted through the four acts, and wound up 
finally in a farcical wooing, at which the audi- 
ence laughed joyously. But really, Richard's 
love, and Dorothy's troubles, and the duke's 
wickedness, and Mr. Manners's despicable 
cowardice, — none of these amounted to 
much. All that counted was what happened 
this minute. Mr. Rose's admonition was, 
" See, forget, and promise not to anticipate." 



John Drew in Comedy and Romance, 41 

Of course, certain scenes from the novel 
reappeared on the stage, in one guise or an- 
other. Otherwise " Richard Carvel " would 
not have been a dramatisation. At the be- 
ginning of each act, moreover, the auditor 
was informed, by a red-coated captain chat- 
ting over his affairs with a half-drunken inn- 
keeper, or some similarly ingenious expedient, 
of all that had happened between the cur- 
tains. Accordingly, by the time the end of 
it all was reached in the betrothal of Richard 
and Dorothy, pretty nearly everything in Mr. 
Churchill's book had been rehearsed in one 
form or another on the stage. 

Mr. Drew's Richard Carvel was the work 
of an excellent actor, who had training enough 
and technique enough to carry him over many 
ticklish places. There was an excellent sim- 
ulation of the breadth and sweep of melo- 
drama, of swaggering youthfulness and of 
romantic flavour. There was vivacity, nim- 
bleness, and variety. There was, however, 



42 Famous Actors. 

no spontaneity, and no conviction. Richard 
Carvel did not blot out the remembrance of 
Mr. Drew's skill as a splendid impersonator 
of modern light comedy characters. 




X. C. GOODWIN 
As Richard Carewe in '• When We Were Twenty-one." 



CHAPTER III. 

N. C. GOODWIN, THE COMEDIAN. 

After the mock heroics and the feeble 
tragedy of Clyde Fitch's " Nathan Hale," it 
was most grateful to have returned to us, 
with delicacy undiminished, with subtilty un- 
harmed, with humour not a whit broadened, 
and with pathos as compelling as ever, the 
comedian, N. C. Goodwin, set forth for our 
delectation in H. V. Esmond's capital play, 
" When We Were Twenty-one." Mr. Good- 
win has ambitions, of course, and ambitions, 
rightly directed, are praiseworthy articles ; 
but I, for one, do wish that Mr. Goodwin's 
ambitions would keep him in the field which 
is his beyond compare, the field of delicious 
light comedy. In his line — and it is no 
43 



44 Famous Actors. 

mean, narrow, restricted line at that — he is 
the best that the American stage can boast 
of. Why can he not be content with it and 
quit experimenting? But " Nathan Hale" 
made money, you say, and besides, Goodwin 
was certainly excellent in the title part. But 
the play ! The play ! An unformed thing 
that ploughed to a death scene, which was 
unforgivable outside of history ! And the 
part ! An almost passive sufferer, who let 
himself be driven unresisting and purpose- 
lessly this way and that throughout the 
entire affair ! 

"When We Were Twenty-one," on the 
other hand, was not only entertaining ; it had 
novelty as well as charm, original ideas as 
well as dramatic interest. It put thought 
into one's head at the same time that it 
kindled a healthy glow around one's heart. 
In the second act Mr. Esmond satisfacto- 
rily demonstrated a dramatic principle, which 
must have appalled the conscientious stage- 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 45 

manager, who was first called upon to con- 
sider it as a serious proposition in a play- 
designed for popular approval. Mr. Esmond 
showed distinctly and convincingly that it 
was perfectly reasonable to allow that the 
average gathering in a theatre had some 
power of intuition and interpretation, — a 
weak, small power, doubtless, not unlike 
Holland in the concert of nations, but a 
real and tangible possession, nevertheless, 
capable under stimulation of seeing for itself 
a number of interesting conditions. 

For instance, in the second act of this 
comedy, a situation was reached where a 
young man, known as the Imp, was betrothed 
to a young woman named Phyllis. Entering 
also into the case was a bachelor of forty 
years, called Richard Carewe, guardian of 
the Imp and interested in Phyllis and her 
mother to the extent of permitting them to 
manage his household while he footed the 
bills without a murmur, although he was 



46 Famous Actors. 

obliged to sacrifice his annual shooting and 
his daily horseback riding to do it. Such a 
kind heart naturally had to be rewarded, and, 
to be a bit slangy, — the indignity is pardon- 
able inasmuch as the situation was thoroughly 
conventional, — it was "up to" Mr. Esmond 
to sidetrack the love-affair of the Imp and 
Phyllis, and give Carewe a clear track on the 
main line. 

To do this properly and without shocking 
any one, several things were necessary. 
First, the young woman had to be con- 
sidered ; for the popular mind, wholly regard- 
less of what it may feel in real life, in 
fictional cases is always chivalrously sensitive. 
It had to be settled absolutely that Phyllis's 
happiness depended on Carewe. It had to 
be explained that, although she was engaged 
to the Imp, she loved him only as a brother, 
or something of that kind, while her heart 
was actually fixed with unalterable steadfast- 
ness on the somewhat elderly bachelor. It 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 47 

had also to be shown that the bachelor him- 
self, in spite of the fact that he was deter- 
mined to see the Imp and Phyllis married, 
loved the girl with that unselfish and self- 
sacrificing devotion that is so admirable in 
elderly gentlemen. Finally the Imp had to 
be gotten rid of, not by leading him away 
a willing lamb to the slaughter, which would 
scarcely have been expedient, — for no one 
likes to see a hearty youngster foregoing 
the matrimonial hitch for the sake of a gray- 
haired veteran in the walks of life, — but 
through some voluntary act of his own. 

Mr. Esmond accomplished this direful 
deed by making the Imp become madly infat- 
uated with a theatrical young woman known 
as the Firefly ; but, inasmuch as this tragic pil- 
lorying of a youth's illusions, his final rescue 
through the good offices of his friends, and 
the successful promulgation of the impres- 
sion that the Imp was not a bad sort of 
chap after all, — only very young, very fool- 



48 Famous Actors. 

ish, and very headstrong, — made up the 
plot of the comedy, I shall say nothing 
about them. Plots are to be enjoyed as 
they develop in the play, and only in the 
case of melodrama, which one should never 
experience unless armed fully with a map 
of the action, should never be revealed in 
public. 

However, the plot was only incidentally 
connected with Mr. Esmond's vindication of 
the great principle of suggestion, which was 
used to let the house in on the important 
fact that Carewe loved Phyllis, and that 
Phyllis loved Carewe. There were any 
number of ordinary ways of doing this 
simple thing, — servants, soliloquies, inter- 
ested friends and whatnot, — but, with mer- 
ciful kindness, Mr. Esmond would have none 
of them. Mere words were too bald and 
too indelicate for the situation. His artistic 
sense steered him from this pitfall, and he 
proceeded to make it plain, by the most 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 49 

delicious comedy touches, — all of them too 
fine and too keen for statement, but every- 
one of them true and sure, and intellectually 
delightful, — how matters stood between the 
couple. It was a dainty bit of plausibility, 
and it was flattering, too, for every one of 
us out front, inwardly congratulated himself 
on his mental shrewdness in rightfully inter- 
preting Mr. Esmond's suggestions. 

"When We Were Twenty-one" was a 
thoroughly enjoyable comedy, — decidedly 
original in the first act, with its realistic 
presentation of the birthday party of the 
four life-long chums, its touches of idealistic 
comradeship and genuine nobility in the 
dawning affair of the Imp ; wonderfully well 
written in the second act, still quietly nat- 
ural, but always intensely interesting and 
emotionally true, granting to the auditor, as 
already explained, a modicum of good sense ; 
a bit more theatrical, and consequently less 
worthy, in the " fast " life scene of the third 



50 Famous Actors. 

act ; and again, at the last act, quiet and 
effective, with an appealing bit of sentiment 
in the reunion of Carewe and the Imp, al- 
though, aside from this, the genuine tone 
of the clearing-up process smacked somewhat 
of the usual thing. 

Mr. Goodwin himself acted Carewe in his 
best modern style. His comedy was fin- 
ished and quiet, and his pathos sincere and 
touching. He did lack something of polish, 
though the fault was a minor one, and his 
love-making in the last act struck me as just 
a trifle too farcical. The character itself was 
very near to life, and Mr. Goodwin's art bore 
well the supreme test of close comparison 
with the real thing. In fact, throughout 
there were splendid indications of Mr. Es- 
mond's mastery of character. He presented 
no types and no freaks, yet his personages 
were all fixedly set apart one from the other, 
and they were eminently human. Also in 
his humour, Mr. Esmond was essentially 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 51 

dramatic. He did not set pinwheels to 
buzzing, nor sky-rockets to shrieking, but 
he accomplished a far worthier thing in 
plucking his chuckle-breeding fun from the 
dramatic situations. 

During the spring of 1901 Mr. Goodwin 
made a rapid tour of the country, going as 
far west as Chicago, as Shylock in Shake- 
speare's "The Merchant of Venice/' it being 
his first appearance in this famous part. 
The familiar Augustin Daly version of the 
play was used. In this the episode of 
the rings is retained, as it is also in Sir 
Henry Irving' s version, and thus at the 
close of the play one is left with the comedy 
impression strong and full as Shakespeare 
intended. For, notwithstanding how heavily 
with the woes of his people the Jew Shylock 
may be laden, " The Merchant of Venice," if 
properly treated, remains always and ever a 
comedy. 

This introduction is pertinent, for it was 



52 Famous Actors, 

this comedy element of the drama that was 
most potently felt in the Goodwin produc- 
tion. It has been the habit on the stage — 
mainly because the character of Shylock has 
been seized upon by actors as a subject for a 
virtuoso exhibition — to turn Shakespeare's 
play from the comedy into the tragedy 
channel. In emphasising Shylock, the de- 
licious lightness of the charming companion 
plot, in which Portia is the main figure, has 
been sacrificed, sometimes even to the extent 
of omitting the ring episode altogether. 

Even in the Irving production, wherein 
the fame of Ellen Terry was accorded due 
recognition by retaining the full strength of 
Portia, Shylock's prominence was great 
enough to destroy the balance, and to kill to 
a considerable extent one's interest in the 
action after the trial scene. The ring epi- 
sode came in the nature of an anti-climax, 
and one's faith in the mightiness of Shake- 
speare's dramatic workmanship was shaken. 




By permission of Burr Mcintosh. 

N. C. GOODWIN 

As Shvlock in " The Merchant of Venice.' 



N. C. Goodzviiiy the Comedian. 53 

One blamed him for the fault, instead of 
blaming the actors who perverted his work. 

I feel justified, therefore, in calling the 
Goodwin presentation of " The Merchant of 
Venice " the best balanced performance of 
the drama that I ever saw. The ratio be- 
tween the plot dealing with the fortunes 
of Shylock and Antonio, and that showing 
the progress of the love of Bassanio and 
Portia, was maintained with surprising even- 
ness. Whatever restrictions one may have 
reserved regarding the individual imperson- 
ations, he was obliged to concede that the 
play as a whole was splendidly treated. 

Often, in productions of "The Merchant 
of Venice/ ' one has noticed interest in the 
action manifestly weaken when Shylock was 
not on the stage. One has seen the scenes 
with the caskets, and even the dainty by- 
play between Portia and Nerissa, drag in 
wearisome measure. One has perceived that 
all the energies of the players, and all the 



54 Famous Actors. 

attention of the spectators, were. focused on 
the trial scene, the end of everything coming 
with Shylock's portentous departure from 
the tribunal, from which disaster and dis- 
grace and despair had descended upon him. 
Acted in that fashion, "The Merchant of 
Venice ,, seemed a tragedy in which Portia 
had but a meagre part. 

However effective as an exposition of 
Shylock's character such a performance of 
"The Merchant of Venice " may be, it cer- 
tainly is not according to the play that 
Shakespeare wrote. Shakespeare weighed 
his two plots equally one against the other, 
played a delicate game of pitch and toss 
between the two, gave Shy lock the early 
advantage and Portia the late, brought 
him into striking prominence in the trial 
scene in order that he might form the more 
dramatic background for her shrewdly devel- 
oped triumph. Finally — and we may disre- 
gard in this finding the historical fact that 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 55 

Shylock was originally a low comedy part — 
Shakespeare ended his drama in the merriest 
manner imaginable, with every dark shadow 
dispelled, with love laughing and happy. 

Such, indeed, was the leading impression 
conveyed by the Goodwin production of the 
play, a production, therefore, that it was fair 
to account a capable presentation of "The 
Merchant of Venice " as a logically devel- 
oped drama. It was a presentation in which 
there was a preponderance neither of Shy- 
lock nor of Portia ; in which the Portia 
scenes were essentials, not merely tributa- 
ries ; in which there was no anticlimax after 
the trial scene, the light comedy of the epi- 
sode of the rings being quickly caught up, 
and the play ending in a brilliant blaze of 
light-hearted jest and joyousness. 

To find the cause for the general evenness 
of this production, one must look chiefly to 
the Shylock of Mr. Goodwin. In a rough 
analysis of the drama, one notices, arrayed 



$6 Famous Actors. 

on one side of the scale of interest, Shylock 
and Antonio, and on the other side Portia 
and Nerissa. Acting as mediaries between 
the two are Bassanio, Gratiano, and later 
Lorenzo and Jessica. In most presentations 
of the play, the chief histrionic interest has 
been consistently centred in Shylock, with 
the result that Bassanio, Gratiano, and the 
rest, instead of running back and forth be- 
tween Shylock and Portia, have constantly 
remained fixed at Shylock's side, thus bring- 
ing down the scale in his favour. With Mr. 
Goodwin this did not happen, for his Shylock 
was never strong enough to seize one's whole 
attention. Consequently, one had interest to 
spare for Maxine Elliott's Portia, and for the 
comedy of which Portia was the centre and 
the life. 

When I say that the Goodwin Shylock 
was not strong enough to seize the whole 
attention, I do not mean to be understood 
as declaring that the actor made a failure of 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 57 

the character, for he did nothing of the sort. 
Henry Austin Clapp summarised the case 
as follows : " The critic has a right to say 
that Mr. Goodwin's interpretation of the Jew, 
viewed by the light of the actor's past, of his 
training, and of his long immersion in the 
trivialities of the stage, is not only highly 
creditable to him, but quite remarkable. In 
comparison, too, with several other assump- 
tions of the leading character of the drama, 
Mr. Goodwin's Shylock will be found to be 
worthy. Mr. Goodwin makes of the Jew a 
picturesque and eye-filling figure, emphasis- 
ing some traditionally Hebraic peculiarities, as 
in the high-bridged and curved nose and the 
many separated curls of the hair. He deliv- 
ers his text with spirit and intelligence, and 
at the moments of highest pressure is not 
extravagant or pathetic. 

" His opening scene was particularly good 
in its clarity and vitality, and, both by Mr. 
Goodwin and the representatives of Antonio 



58 Famous Actors. 

and Bassanio, was carried out on what is 
undoubtedly the true Shakespearian theory, 
namely, that the hostility of Shylock is rec- 
ognised, and his professions of amiability are 
understood to be ironical. In his passages 
with Jessica, Mr. Goodwin's acting was ex- 
pressive and adequate. Shylock's tremendous 
tirade in the third act, Mr. Goodwin deliv- 
ered with much fire and full of sincerity of 
passion, though he committed the mistake of 
not carrying his crescendo out to the very 
close of the passage, so as to make its height 
at the words, 'And it shall go hard, but I 
will better the instruction.' In the early pas- 
sages of the trial scene, Mr. Goodwin acted 
well up to his conception of the Jew, but if 
he quite failed to impress in his last three 
speeches, the fault lay deep down in his 
conception. 

" Mr. Goodwin introduced one important 
novelty. At the close of the scene of revel 
in front of his dwelling, he repeated Mr. 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 59 

Irving's innovation by retracing his steps 
over the bridge. But he did not stop at 
the door of his house and stand there knock- 
ing ; he proceeded to rush through the door, 
which had been left open, and from within his 
home the spectator heard his repeated calls 
for Jessica, and his cries, ' Oh, my ducats ! 
Oh, my daughter ! Fled with a Christian ! ' 
Then he rushed wildly out of the house and 
partly over the bridge, where he met a com- 
patriot, meanwhile rending the air with cries 
of < Justice ! The law ! My ducats and my 
daughter ! ' After the duke's sentence that 
'he presently become a Christian/ Mr. Good- 
win, as nearly as could be seen, made some- 
thing like the sign of the cross, — which 
might be supposed to mean that he accepted 
the judgment/ ' 

A great Shylock Mr. Goodwin certainly 
was not, but he was a good Shylock, an in- 
telligent Shylock, an understandable and a 
human Shylock, and, moreover, a Shylock 



60 Famous Actors. 

not so overweighted as to be out of propor- 
tion to the play as a whole. Mr. Goodwin's 
conception of the part, on general lines, dif- 
fered in no essential particular from the 
Macklin tradition, though the malignancy 
was softened, the hatred made spiteful, the 
avariciousness especially dwelt upon, and the 
deep affection for Jessica barely revealed. 

What did the Goodwin Shylock lack ? It 
was that indescribable quality of distinction, 
impressiveness, personal force and appeal, 
that lift a personation from the generally 
good to the decidedly great. In a word, big- 
ness of soul never was in evidence. Mr. 
Goodwin's Shylock interested one, but it did 
not thrill one. It engendered no positive 
emotion either of hate or of pity, of horror 
or of sympathy. The actor seemingly had 
not done much more than skim the surface of 
the part. He missed points that other play- 
ers have made familiar, and he had no new 
ones of his own to make up the deficiency. 



N. C. Goodwin, the Comedian. 61 

He did not cut down to the quick with an 
incisiveness that demonstrated understanding 
and conscious mastery. In the trial scene 
Mr. Goodwin ventured on more comedy than 
the modern stage has been accustomed to. 
This was, of course, thoroughly legitimate, 
though it did have the disadvantage of weak- 
ening the impressiveness of a Shylock, who 
was supposed to be the embodiment of im- 
placable race hatred. 



CHAPTER IV. 

JOHN B. MASON IN MODERN COMEDY. 

In the fall of 1899, John B. Mason, at that 
time known to the New York theatregoer 
mainly by his admirable impersonation of 
the none too thankful part of Horatio Drake 
in " The Christian/' became the leading man 
of Daniel Frohman's Lyceum Theatre Stock 
Company, an organisation that in point of 
age and merit has the right to claim first 
place in the American theatre, since the 
passing away of Augustin Daly's famous 
band of players. Its only rival is the Empire 
Theatre Company, a splendid troupe ; but 
Daniel Frohman's aggregation has succeeded 
in securing for itself an atmosphere of per- 
manency, a traditional flavour, and even a 

62 




JOHN B MASON. 



John B. Mason in Modern Comedy. 63 

standard of art, apart from commercialism, 
that his brother Charles's pet organisation has 
not yet acquired. Moreover, while the Em- 
pire Theatre Company has wandered far and 
wide in the field of plays, producing almost 
everything of the better class, from melo- 
drama to farce, that promised profit, the 
Lyceum Company has of late years confined 
itself entirely to modern comedy, and 
modern comedy, at that, of strictly English 
up-to-dateness. Thus Daniel Frohman has 
given us " Trelawney of the Wells," " Wheels 
Within Wheels/' "The Manoeuvres of Jane," 
and "The Ambassador." During this same 
period the Empire Theatre productions have 
included "The Conquerors," melodramatic, 
and many said worse ; " Phroso," certainly 
worse ; the ever delightful " Lord and Lady 
Algy," and the not uninteresting "Brother 
Officers." 

It is not too much to say that, as the lead- 
ing man of the Lyceum Theatre Company, 



64 Famous Actors, 

John B. Mason has in two seasons firmly 
established himself as the finest modern 
comedy actor in this country. I am fully 
aware that this statement may cause many 
a reader to leap to his feet with hot denials 
on his tongue, with quivering finger pointing 
to N. C. Goodwin in particular, and to half 
a dozen others, perhaps, in general. Let us 
consider the matter calmly. I will modestly 
limit Mr. Mason's supremacy to modern 
comedy of the Pinero, Jones, and Carton 
type, and furthermore to the straight comedy 
parts in such plays. I claim nothing for 
him as a light comedian, though as a mat- 
ter of fact I know that he is an excellent 
one. I say nothing of his ability as a ro- 
mantic actor, though I am well aware that 
he has talent in that line. I make no refer- 
ence to his capabilities as a character 
actor, in which field, to tell the truth, I 
believe that he is not ever likely to dis- 
tinguish himself. I merely ask for Mr. 



John B. Mason in Modem Comedy. 65 

Mason recognition in the single line of 
work in which he has displayed an art so 
delicate, so subtle, so natural, so human, that 
it has seemed the realism of nature instead 
of the realism of art. 

I can imagine no stage portraits more truth- 
ful or more convincing than Mr. Mason's 
representations of two wholly different speci- 
mens of the gentleman of to-day portrayed 
in " Wheels Within Wheels " and " The Am- 
bassador.' ' They were English gentlemen, 
to be sure, the one regrettable feature about 
them, for the American theatre patron is 
hungering mightily for precisely such repro- 
ductions of American gentlemen ; but, for- 
tunately, the true gentleman, of whatever 
nationality, is in the essentials cosmopolitan, 
however different he may be in matters of 
mere etiquette. He is not the whited sepul- 
chre of polished politeness. He is the full 
measure of a man, instinctive in his chivalry, 
noble in his self-control, keenly appreciative 



66 Famous Actors. 

of honest sentiment, but neither a milksop 
nor a railer at fate. 

Such a man was Lord Eric Chantrell in 
R. C. Carton's "Wheels Within Wheels." 
Thus he was conceived by the dramatist, and 
thus he was presented by the actor. It was a 
wonderfully fine study of a man who had lived 
through every phase of modern worldliness, 
and who had come from the test wholly un- 
spoiled, a man whose varied experiences had 
broadened his humanity and deepened his 
sympathies, whose respect for woman was 
inherent, not a mere surface decoration, 
who was slow to judge and tolerant in 
thought and in deed. No better picture ever 
was drawn of the modern man, perfectly 
poised, sure of himself and understanding 
others, feeling much but saying little, mean- 
ing more by a handshake than might be 
expressed by the most voluble phrases. 

It was not altogether easy to select a clas- 
sification for " Wheels Within Wheels " as a 



John B. Mason i7i Modem Comedy. 6y 

play, but by calling it a farce, one delicately 
shirked responsibility. As a matter of fact, 
"Wheels Within Wheels " might be said to 
travel a narrow side-path along the road of 
light comedy, after starting fair and square 
in the middle of the comedy highway. The 
vehicle began to turn toward the aforesaid side- 
path about the time a third of the distance had 
been covered. After it had left the comedy 
road altogether, it did not come back to it 
again until just before the end of the journey 
was reached. 

In naming a class for " Wheels Within 
Wheels," one had three possible selections. 
He might call the play a light comedy, which 
would require a critical, possibly misleading, 
and on the whole uselessly serious survey of 
the merits and demerits of the work. He 
might call it a comedy bordering on farce, a 
cumbersome and unsatisfactory designation 
that would only beg the question and de- 
mand tedious explanations. Or he might 



68 Famous Actors. 

throw logic, artistic coherency, and proba- 
bility to the winds, declare the affair a farce, 
and let it go at that. 

The truth was, that the conclusion of Mr. 
Carton's play was disappointing when com- 
pared with the beginning. The first act was 
superlatively good, — brilliantly constructed, 
wittily written, and daringly suggestive in a 
most original and effective way. This act 
was light comedy of the most charming and 
fascinating kind, and it left one in an inter- 
esting condition of suspense. The things 
that might have happened after this introduc- 
tion were multitudinous ; the particular thing 
that did happen was permissible in nothing 
except the wildest farce. Inasmuch as farce 
was not naturally expected from a first act so 
deliciously conceived, I think that we were 
justly entitled to our feeling of disappoint- 
ment that " Wheels Within Wheels " was not 
as a whole equal to its parts. 

The dramatic scheme, which John Oliver 



John B. Mason in Modern Comedy. 69 

Hobbes (Mrs. Craigie) had in mind when she 
decided to write "The Ambassador,'' was 
neither new, startling, nor necessarily ineffect- 
ive. It was simply to fling into the midst 
of the heartless, frivolous life of the higher 
classes — in novels and plays the life of the 
higher classes always reeks with heartless- 
ness and frivolity, with women who call one 
another "cats," with interesting men who 
have punctured reputations, and with good 
men who are either unbearable bores orjiope- 
less cads — into the midst of this very familiar 
higher class life, to plunge a throbbing and 
idealistic love story. She would make, she 
declared, a hardened man of the world — 
more than that, a disillusioned diplomatist, 
who, in addition to meddling with the fate of 
nations, had found time, in the course of his 
existence, to break twice a hundred female 
hearts — become at first sight madly infatu- 
ated, even to the marrying point, with a dear, 
sweet, innocent slip of a girl just out of 



yo Famous Actors. 

school, without a fortune, and without any 
family to speak of. Then, as a gloomy con- 
trast to this bright, glorious romance, Mrs. 
Craigie continued, there should be the woman, 
who loved the unconscious diplomatist with 
undying devotion, a noble-hearted, generous, 
and large-souled creature, a mother of boys, 
a woman who could sacrifice her own happi- 
ness with a smile on her lips, though there 
were tears in her eyes. An excellent scheme, 
surely, which does not read half badly even 
when reduced to its lowest terms with cruel 
commonplaceness ! 

Unfortunately, however, it was a scheme 
supercharged with sentimentality, though not 
incapable, possibly, under the manipulation of 
the crafty playwright, of making a certain 
appeal to a romantically sensitive audience. 
Mrs. Craigie, however, did not show herself 
a practised playwright. Although there was 
no especial lack of technical skill in the con- 
struction of her comedy, and although there 



John B. Mason in Modem Comedy. Ji 

was often pith, cynical truth, and epigram- 
matical cleverness in her lines, she failed in 
the very essential particular of establishing 
an illusion. Her play was without the kin- 
dling touch of humanity. Her characters, 
with the one exception of Lady Beauvedere, 
made no impression of reality. Her action 
throughout suffered for want of a convincing 
motive. Outwardly, her play, cast so abso- 
lutely in the modern school of light comedy, 
contained nothing beyond possibility or even 
probability. Indeed, in the reading it struck 
one as an unusually brilliant bit of stage- 
craft. On the stage, however, its brilliancy 
proved most unsatisfyingly superficial and 
most palpably artificial, while its theme was 
vague and uncertain. 

Yet the fact of a middle-aged man falling 
in love with a young girl was not so uncom- 
mon as to make one dumb with amazement ; 
but the point that Mrs. Craigie overlooked, 
it seemed to me, was the necessity of proving 



J2 Famous Actors. 

that' such a love was, in the circumstances 
represented in her play, well within the range 
of probability. She forgot that, although the 
unexpected is always bound to happen on 
the stage, still it must not happen without 
definite cause. When Lord St. Orbyn re- 
marked to the girlish Juliet Gainsborough 
that, after five days' acquaintance, he loved 
her as he had never loved the two hundred 
or so women whom he had loved before, even 
an exceedingly polite audience could not re- 
press an incredulous chuckle. This love at 
first sight, baldly proclaimed by Mrs. Craigie 
as an unproven fact, was so wholly uncon- 
vincing that every individual in the theatre 
started at once on a hunt after a concealed 
reason for St. Orbyn's infatuation. 

Now it had happened that, in the first act 
of her play, Mrs. Craigie, solely for the pur- 
pose of showing Miss Gainsborough's social 
impossibility, innocently exploited, with much 
laboured finesse, a bit of ancient scandal re- 



John B. Mason in Modern Comedy. 73 

garding Juliet's mother, who, it seemed, if 
she ~ had not been opportunely thrown from 
her horse and killed, would have displayed 
the bad taste to run away with a man not 
her husband. Curiously enough, when it 
became necessary to explain why St. Orbyn 
fell in love with Juliet, the mind of at least 
one person reverted to the antique gossip of 
the first act. Of course, such a joyously 
melodramatic scheme as making St. Orbyn 
the man who had planned to elope with 
Juliet's mother never occurred to Mrs. 
Craigie, though I do believe that even this 
crudely theatrical explanation would have 
been an improvement on no explanation 
at all. 

It was an impossible task for an actor 
to vitalise more than superficially such a 
character as St. Orbyn, and Mr. Mason 
was, to be sure, only the skilled player 
in his assumption of the part. That was 
not his fault. Here and there, when the 



74 Famous Actors. 

character gave him a chance, his quality 
rang true. 

"The Man of Forty/' which was presented 
by the Daniel Frohman Company at Daly's 
Theatre, on November 26, 1900, with Mr. 
Mason in the part from which the comedy 
took its name, did not have any great suc- 
cess, though it afforded Mr. Mason an oppor- 
tunity to display his art in one of those 
polished, easy-going characters, which he has 
so thoroughly at his finger-tips. Indeed, 
he was adversely criticised for being almost 
too natural and too indifferent to theatrical 
effect. This rich and good-natured gentle- 
man of forty was in love with a woman in 
the embarrassing situation of not knowing 
whether her husband was alive or dead. The 
husband proved to be alive, for he came upon 
the scene in time to delay the marriage. 
Then the middle-aged man's daughter fell 
in love with the husband, and matters were 
in this generally disagreeable state, when 



John B. Mason in Modem Comedy. 75 

the extraneous husband conveniently died 
of heart-disease at the end of the third act. 
The best that could be said of the play was 
that it was commonplace ; the worst, that its 
characters amounted to nothing, that its sit- 
uations were undeveloped, and its workman- 
ship slovenly, and that its wit was dull and 
heavy. 

It soon was displaced by R. C. Carton's 
"Lady Huntworth's Experiment," which 
might briefly be summed up as the ad- 
ventures of a lady as a cook. She did 
her masquerading in the kitchen of an Eng- 
lish vicarage, and the result was that all the 
men in the cast fell in love with her, in- 
cluding Captain Dorvaston, a blundering, 
brusque, gruff, but good-hearted cavalry of- 
ficer, betrothed to the pretty niece of the 
vicar. Dorvaston believed himself anxious 
only to offer honest friendship and help 
to the cook, whom he recognised as "a 
lady down on her luck.'* Of course, the 



J 6 Famous Actors. 

captain did not really love the vicar's niece 
to whom he was engaged, any more than she 
really loved him, and, consequently, when the 
niece eloped with the handsome curate, the 
captain, without wasting any time in grief, 
rushed after information regarding the earli- 
est train that would take him to the side of 
his vanished cook. Mr. Mason as Captain 
Dorvaston gave an artistic character study, 
making the genial, blundering soldier thor- 
oughly lovable, even if a trifle abrupt. 




FRITZ WILLIAMS. 



CHAPTER V. 

FRITZ WILLIAMS. 

As leading juvenile of Daniel Frohman's 
Lyceum Theatre Company, Fritz Williams 
was generally regarded — and rightly, too — 
as the first of the younger generation of 
comedians on the American stage. His 
best work seemed to be done in light comedy 
parts that bordered on the eccentric. His 
acting was remarkable for its brilliancy, 
vivacity, and unflagging spirit. It was clean- 
cut, but it was also cold. There was very 
little of the broad sympathy of full-blooded 
humour in evidence, but a great deal of the 
biting quality that is inherent in wit. What 
Mr. Williams's gifts in the way of portraying 
sentiment may be, no one can be sure, for 
77 



78 Famous Actors. 

recently he has done nothing except play- 
youthful husbands in French farces, char- 
acters that are solely vehicles of mechan- 
ically devised comedy. That he did at one 
time possess the true spirit of comedy was 
shown by his impersonation of the devoted 
darky in Dion Boucicault's play, " Fin-ma- 
coul." Into that part he introduced the vein 
of pathos without which no comedian can 
hope ever to be great. 

Mr. Williams, who was named Frederick 
after his father, was born in Boston on 
August 23, 1865, the night that his father 
made his first appearance at the Boston 
Museum as Modus in "The Hunchback." 
His parents were members of the Museum 
Company for fifteen years, and it was at that 
house that the infant Fritz made his first 
appearance on any stage, being carried on in 
the arms of William Warren, the comedian, 
as the fractious baby in a farce called " See- 
ing Warren.' " The boy's parents intended 



Fritz Williams. 79 

to make a musician of him, and school duties, 
therefore, were augmented by the study of 
the violin. Still, the lad had a natural taste 
for the theatre, as is shown by the following 
anecdote, related by Mr. Williams : 

"I remember one instance of my early 
boyhood with a vividness born of its danger, 
real and, to my young mind, impending. My 
father allowed me sometimes to accompany 
him to the theatre, and there, one night, I 
saw Frank Cranfrau in his well-known play 
of 'Kit, the Arkansaw Traveller.' I thought 
it the most wonderful thing I had ever seen, 
and was fired with a desire to figure as the 
burly hero myself. I succeeded in concoct- 
ing a version of the play and placed it in 
rehearsal with the neighbour's children, in the 
neighbour's stable. Even at that early age I 
had a strong leaning toward stage effects, and 
decided that we must have the great steam- 
boat explosion. My lack of knowledge, re- 
garding how these effects were made in the 



80 Famous Actors. 

theatre, did not prevent me from proceeding 
in my own way. A bundle of large cannon 
crackers was produced, and three were placed 
in each of four barrels filled with sawdust. 
We had a crowded house, and the audience 
seemed as delighted with the play as we were 
ourselves. 'Ah,' I said, 'wait until the ex- 
plosion. Then they will go wild/ They did. 
When the time arrived, I set fire to the fuse. 
In an instant came a terrific explosion, and 
the air was filled with smoke and burning 
sawdust. Consternation prevailed. Shouts 
of ' Fire ! ' soon arose, and with reason. The 
burning sawdust ignited the roof beyond our 
reach. I instantly decided that I would feel 
better somewhere else, and fled for home. 
By the time the fire-engines got to the blaz- 
ing stable, I was in bed and feigning a sleep 
that did not really come until long after the 
engines had ceased their pumping.'* 

In 1879, young Williams made a great 
impression as a singer and actor of quaint 



Fritz Williams, 81 

comedy in the part of Sir Joseph Porter in 
"Pinafore/' acted by a juvenile company, of 
which Effie Shannon was also a member, at 
the Boston Museum. At this period he 
played the violin with some skill, and was 
able to read his part in the operetta from the 
score at sight during the first rehearsal. 
Later in this same year the Williams family 
moved to New York, where Fritz was heard 
in public again, this time as a concert vocal- 
ist. On St. Patrick's Day, 1880, Patrick 
Sarsfield Gilmore gave a big concert in Madi- 
son Square Garden. One of the numbers 
was "Gilmore's American Anthem," and this 
was sung by the boy from Boston at both 
the afternoon and evening performances, and 
rousingly encored he was, too. 

Mr. Williams had at that time a singing 
voice of much power and beauty. Unfortu- 
nately, a reckless devotion to baseball and 
yelling, when on the field with the nine of 
Fordham College, destroyed it. In New 



82 Famous Actors. 

York, Williams became a member of the 
orchestra of the Germania Theatre, after- 
ward Tony Pastor's, and under the leadership 
of Herr Neuendorf, played one of the first 
violins for two seasons. At college, how- 
ever, the idea of acting seized him, and while 
still a student, he made his first bow to an 
audience as a professional actor at Wallack's 
Theatre, New York, in the part of Anatole in 
"A Scrap of Paper," Mr. Wallack being the 
Prosper of the cast. Mr. Williams, by the 
way, graduated at St. John's College, Ford- 
ham, when he was twenty years old, taking 
second honours in Greek. 

Here it might be well to explain how Mr. 
Williams came by the name of Fritz. As 
his father was also Frederick, abbreviated to 
Fred, it occasioned some confusion in the 
family. To get around this inconvenience, 
Fred junior was known as Fritz. Mr. Wal- 
lack, who met the boy frequently at the 
Grand Opera House, then under the manage- 



Fritz Williams. 83 

ment of the boy's uncle, Thomas Donnelly, 
placed the name Fritz on the bill of the play 
in which young Williams made his debut, and 
Fritz he remained ever after. 

After "A Scrap of Paper," Mr. Williams 
made a decided hit as Jimmy in "Nita's 
First." For two seasons he continued at 
Wallack's, receiving personal training and 
instruction at the hands of the accomplished 
actor at the head of the company. Then he 
became a member of the company controlled 
by Dion Boucicault, playing the juvenile and 
light comedy parts, among them Geoffrey 
Tudor in " The Jilt." With this organisation 
he remained for three seasons, deriving all 
the benefit association with so gifted a man 
as Boucicault could bestow. 

After this, a season's experience as the 
leading man of a travelling company, that of 
Arthur Rehan, who had the monopoly on 
the road of Augustin Daly's comedies, was 
enough to persuade the young comedian that 



84 Famous Actors. 

a permanent residence in New York as a 
member of a stock company was preferable 
to a peripatetic career, even as leading man, 
and he secured an engagement with the 
Lyceum Theatre Company, which continued 
until the end of the season of 1 897-98, Mr. 
Williams's best-known parts being the leading 
juvenile characters in "The Wife, ,, "The 
Charity Ball, ,, " The Idler," " Sweet Laven- 
der," "The Marquise," "The Home Secre- 
tary," and "The Case of Rebellious Susan." 
Mr. Williams's identification with farce 
began in October, 1898, when he appeared 
as Alfred Godfray in Alexander Bisson's 
"On and Off." This was followed by ap- 
pearances in such indifferent specimens of 
play-writing as " Coralie & Co.," " Make Way 
for the Ladies," " Self and Lady," and " The 
Lash of the Whip." During the season of 
1900-01, also, Mr. Williams was for a 
brief period spectacularly connected with 
Weber and Fields's Music Hall in New 



Fritz Williams. 85 

York, taking at very short notice the place 
of Charles J. Ross, who suddenly quitted the 
Weber and Fields Company. 

" On and Off " was a farce that was amus- 
ing all the way through. Such farces are 
rarities and worthy of being remembered, — 
no stumbling opening taking up half an act 
before the real action begins, no limping nor 
halting in the second act, no ending that is 
thoroughly nonsensical and palpably a make- 
shift. With " On and Off " the fun began 
at once, and never stopped for an instant 
until the curtain fell on the last act. To 
attempt to ensnare the plot of a really good 
farce in the cumbersome net of "Thus it 
happened," is to do a double injustice; first, 
to the farce itself, for the complications that 
seemed ridiculous when presented on the 
stage utterly lose their savour when de- 
scribed in cold words ; second, to the per- 
son who may some time or other have the 
pleasure of seeing the farce acted. One has 



86 Famous Actors. 

no moral right to deprive him of the joyous 
experience of surprise. And, after all is said, 
surprise is the chief stock in trade of the 
maker of farces. 

"On and Off" was a translation, — and 
an excellent one, to judge by the easy collo- 
quialism of the dialogue, — and not an adap- 
tation from the French, and the fact that it 
was a translation was a distinct merit in 
itself. Adaptation — that is, the resetting 
of fixed incidents in a changed environment 
— is inartistic, if not actually dishonest busi- 
ness. Moreover, it is, except in the most 
exceptional cases, merely a matter of para- 
phrasing. But to translate accurately and 
adequately one must read deeply into the 
spirit of the original, and his understanding 
must be reenforced with sympathy. Having 
ascertained exactly what the foreign author 
has said, the translator must then shift en- 
tirely his point of view in the search for the 
one word and the exact phrase that will 



Fritz Williams. 87 

convey in another tongue the precise mean- 
ing of the original. In the version of " On 
and Off," both atmosphere was preserved 
and intelligibility was attained. The dia- 
logue was snappy and bright, without circum- 
locutions ; and the epigrams and witticisms 
were perfectly Englished. They may have 
been the translator's originations, or they 
may have been adaptations of the French ; 
whichever way it was, they reflected faith- 
fully the spirit of Mr. Bisson's work. 

Yet, when brought face to face with such 
a high grade of light comedy acting as that 
shown by Mr. Williams and Mr. E. M. Hol- 
land in this farce, one was tempted to declare 
that, after all, the play was not the thing. 
Certain it is that no farce was ever written 
which could not be ruined by bad acting ; 
and equally true it is that many a poor farce 
has been pulled through by the strenuous 
endeavours of the mummers. In fact, the 
ordinary farcical ratio may be stated as one- 



88 Famous Actors. 

third play to two-thirds actors. Mr. Hol- 
land's style was, perhaps, a bit more polished 
than Mr. Williams's. Especially fine was his 
perfect repose in the midst of a whirlwind 
of action, some of his best effects being 
obtained simply by doing nothing. At other 
times a glance of the eye, a single gesture, 
or the slightest change in facial expression, 
were used to convey a vastness of meaning. 
His powers of suggestion were apparently 
unlimited. 

Mr. Williams's effects were broader, though 
none the less sure, and, inasmuch as Alfred 
Godfray was at all times the master of the 
situation, Mr. Williams's sweeping sense of 
humour was allowed full play. Moreover, 
he passed through several love-scenes with 
fine taste, and dodged tactfully several situa- 
tions that might have been made exceedingly 
colourful. 




WILLIAM GILLETTE 
As Sherlock Holmes in " Sherlock Holmes/ 



CHAPTER VI. 

WILLIAM GILLETTE AND " SHERLOCK 
HOLMES." 

Modesty is probably a good thing in the 
abstract, even as it is a rare thing in the con- 
crete, so rare, indeed, that when one encoun- 
ters it unawares, or in unexpected places, he 
is apt innocently to be led astray. After all, 
the world's opinion of a man is not unlikely 
to coincide in essentials with the man's opin- 
ion of himself. William Gillette's opinion of 
himself has always seemed to be : " I'm a 
pretty fair sort of stage carpenter, and I'm not 
altogether bad as an actor, after I've written 
myself a part that suits me. But pshaw ! " 

That " But pshaw ! " is Gillette all over, 
and the public in general has unconsciously 
89 



90 Famous Actors. 

taken its cue from him. It pays its money 
gladly and in copious quantities to see Mr. 
Gillette's plays, and to see Mr. Gillette act, 
but when it comes to considering Mr. Gillette 
seriously, either as dramatist or actor, the 
public smiles knowingly, and ejaculates, " But 
pshaw ! " Yet here is a man who brings 
forth plays that are not only successes for 
a season, but which live to a green old age 
in comparison with the ordinary ephemeral 
theatrical works of to-day and yesterday. 

" Held by the Enemy " is exactly as good 
now as it ever was, although its most effect- 
ive situations have been stolen time and 
again, and although the drama itself has 
been repeatedly subjected to the strain of 
stock company productions. "The Private 
Secretary," which has passed through ex- 
periences that would reduce the usual thing 
in farces to a condition that only cremation 
could remedy, is resurrected every now and 
then, and just as surely as it is brought to 



Gillette and "Sherlock Holmes." 91 

life, it makes a hit. " Secret Service " is a 
strong, compelling play, which has inherent 
vigour enough, and keen effectiveness enough 
to furnish a round dozen machine melodramas. 
I know because I have seen it, not only with 
the perfect presentation of Mr. Gillette's own 
company, but through the acting of an organ- 
isation playing the "popular priced " theatres. 
Lastly, there is " Sherlock Holmes," a play 
revolving around the celebrated detective in- 
vented by Dr. A. Conan Doyle. By making 
this drama frank and shameless buncombe, 
Mr. Gillette disarmed to a considerable extent 
any serious criticism. It took no vast intel- 
lect, no supreme intelligence to point out the 
plain fact that there was nothing probable or 
even possible about the play ; that it was sen- 
sationalism run riot, sensationalism idealised ; 
and consequently, after Mr. Gillette had 
cheerfully, and of his own accord, jumped 
from the pedestal of artistic seriousness, 
there was neither wisdom nor profit in mak- 



92 Famous Actors. 

ing believe that he was still up there, and 
valiantly shooting peas at his shadow in order 
to prove it. Still, should one have persisted 
in indulging in this innocent pastime, he 
would first have been compelled to grant 
the passing worthiness of a play that made 
Conan Doyle's fascinating Sherlock Holmes 
so much a reality. By his complete and 
unique realisation of this fantastic, imagina- 
tive, and at the same time potently human 
conception, by his accurate transferral of the 
impossible, but none the less convincing de- 
tective, from the intangible atmosphere of 
bookland to the definite materialism of stage- 
ville, Mr. Gillette honestly earned the reward 
of serious commendation. Here was more 
than mere trickery ; here was positive achieve- 
ment. 

This character is Doctor Doyle's creation, 
— a wholly fictitious, but at the same time a 
wonderfully lifelike conception, a conception 
that appeals to the imagination, arouses in- 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes!' 93 

tense interest, and, moreover, inspires in one 
an almost irresistible desire to go and do like- 
wise. Mr. Gillette succeeded — and a rare 
achievement it was, too — in getting Holmes 
on the stage without robbing him of a single 
one of his subtle charms. Indeed, if any- 
thing, Mr. Gillette, in vividness of personality, 
made Holmes even more irresistible as a 
presence than he was in the book ; at the 
same time, he retained in full Holmes's imag- 
inative appeal, and added, without spoiling 
the original, a faint touch of heart interest 
and sentiment, that tinged the part with the 
shadow of pathos. 

Sherlock Holmes, more than any other 
single factor, raised Mr. Gillette's play from 
a low level of commonplace sensationalism. 
But there were other factors which helped. 
One of these was Mr. Gillette's use of nat- 
ural darkness as a curtain. One never saw 
the theatre curtain rise or fall. The house 
was plunged into darkness first, and the scene 



94 Famous Actors. 

on the stage then gradually came into view 
with a stereopticon-like effect, and at the end 
of the act in similar manner faded from view. 
Trickery ! To be sure, but artistic trickery, 
and trickery, too, that had positive value as a 
stimulus to the imagination. It helped very 
much to establish a certain vague sense of 
unreality, a fairy-story condition of mind that 
was excellent for the proper reception of Mr. 
Gillette's efforts to please. 

Finally, there was the superb way in which 
the story was told. If, as the old saw has it, 
fully half of the effectiveness of a story is in 
the telling of it, then Mr. Gillette got three- 
quarters. The yarn itself was both childish 
and ludicrous, but the method and the man- 
ner in which it was set forth betokened the 
keen masterfulness of a man who knew how 
to use his tools, and who had a big chestful 
of them at his disposal. 

Consequently, the persons who were too 
cultured or too blase, or too anything else, 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes!' 95 

to get thrills, cold chills up and down the 
spine, and all the other bodily indications of 
intense dramatic interest from " Sherlock 
Holmes," or too smart to be caught in any 
theatrical traps, with which the play was so 
plentifully supplied, were very few indeed. 
One might harden his heart and might think 
strenuous thoughts, — neither did him the 
least good. He could not escape the crafty 
Mr. Gillette, whose wiles were many and 
whose cunning was past all understanding. 
" Sherlock Holmes " was melodrama. More- 
over, it was wild, sensational, wholly impossi- 
ble, absolutely absurd melodrama. It was as 
logically indefensible as the penny dreadful 
of the Messenger Boy's Own Library. All 
this condemnation was plainly posted so that 
all might read it. There was no pretense 
about " Sherlock Holmes." It stood for 
exactly what it was, — a most ridiculously 
improbable, and, at the same time, a most 
tremendously absorbing play. 



g6 Famous Actors. 

There was reason in the paradox. Taken 
in cold blood and out of its surroundings, the 
story which formed the groundwork for Mr. 
Gillette's play was supremely ridiculous, — 
this Professor Moriarty, "the Napoleon of 
crime," with his myrmidons haunting the 
London streets, with his mysterious under- 
ground headquarters with its strange, clang- 
ing locks, and its convenient telephones, and 
with his fearsome gas- chamber, — awe-in- 
spiring enough to make the hair of the small 
boy stand on end, but scarcely food for the 
matter-of-fact adult. Still the adult did gulp 
it down with unspeakable eagerness, with 
smackings of the lips and other manifest 
signs of satisfaction. And why ? Wholly 
on account of the way in which it was pre- 
pared and served. The skilful French cook, 
so it is said, can make the most delicious 
soup from a boot-leg, if only he be given full 
swing in the matter of seasoning. Plainly Mr. 
Gillette is a French cook among dramatists. 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes^ 97 

The inherent weakness of " Sherlock 
Holmes'' was the failure of Moriarty as a 
foil to Holmes. The chief mistake seemed 
to have been made in removing Moriarty 
from the half-shadow of his spider-like cell, 
and bringing him forth where every one could 
get a good look at him. The resulting scene 
between Holmes and Moriarty was intensely 
thrilling and all that, but it had, nevertheless, 
a distinctly deteriorating effect on one's in- 
terest in the play. When Holmes made it 
plain that Moriarty was a cheap bluff, he 
pulled the prop from under Mr. Gillette's 
play. After that, attention was centred 
not so much in what happened as in how it 
was done. Moriarty pulling wires in his 
cellar was a creature of mystery and of 
dramatic potentiality. Moriarty out in broad 
daylight was tawdry cheapness, a weakling, 
a blatant ass without force or character, and 
with no personality to inspire confidence in 
him even as a " Napoleon of crime." 



98 Famous Actors. 

The first act of " Sherlock Holmes," with 
its incisive action, its constant suspense, its 
haunting mystery, its vivid characterisations, 
and its menacing Moriarty, was the height 
of melodramatic appeal. Interesting as the 
remainder of the play was, it never again 
exerted similar compelling power. In the 
last act, alone, a carefully nursed mystery 
brought something the same effect, but with 
no such force. How important Moriarty 
was to the play was demonstrated in this last 
act, when, after his arrest, the action came 
to a complete standstill, and was only started 
up again by a personal appeal from Mr. 
Gillette. With a strong Moriarty to make 
the conflict with the omnipotent detective a 
sportsmanlike struggle, "Sherlock Holmes" 
would have been melodramatic perfection. 

Merely to illustrate Mr. Gillette's method, 
I am going to describe the last act somewhat 
in detail. The scene was Doctor Watson's 
office, and as far as the spectators having 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes." 99 

any idea what was going to happen, the 
previous three acts might never have tran- 
spired. When the doctor's room brightened 
from darkness into light, the physician was 
seen giving a worthy-looking woman a bottle 
of medicine. Going out, she took the wrong 
door, and quickly turned this seeming blunder 
into an opportunity to make a hasty examina- 
tion of the surroundings. Thus we learned 
that something was up, though we had not 
the least idea what it might be. 

Next entered an old friend, Sidney Prince, 
the "crook." He was apparently suffering 
from an exceedingly bad cold in the throat, 
but we soon were permitted to see that this 
cold was a "fake." Prince, at length, got 
the doctor out of the room, snapped up the 
shades of the windows, was caught while pry- 
ing about and fired bodily from the house. 
By this time our curiosity was mounting up, 
but we had not yet got the lay of the land. 
The old woman first on the scene we did not 



ioo Famous Actors. 

know. Prince himself we recognised as only 
half a villain. Consequently, we were wholly 
in doubt as regards the precise motive behind 
all these mysterious happenings. 

Then came the beautiful Madge Larrabee, 
the arch-villainess, masquerading as some one 
else and desiring most anxiously that Doctor 
Watson should tell her where she could find 
Sherlock Holmes. Now we began to see day- 
light, and so did the rather stupid doctor. 
Hark ! Big row in the street ! Accident to a 
cab ! Indignant old gentleman and expostulat- 
ing cabman are ushered into the doctor's of- 
fice. Disguises quickly removed ! Sherlock 
Holmes, the detective! Trickery? Cer- 
tainly, the last ditch of trickery ; but, while 
the action is under full swing, the acme of 
theatrical effectiveness. 

A noticeable technical point in " Sherlock 
Holmes " was the manner in which the char- 
acter of John Forman, Holmes's faithful 
stool-pigeon, was developed. Throughout 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes" 101 

the first act of the play Mr. Gillette, evi- 
dently in order to avoid weakening Holmes's 
business, violated with the utmost noncha- 
lance the law of play-writing, which rules that 
the audience must be given an inside view of 
affairs on the stage at the earliest possible 
moment. Forman was a prominent person- 
age in the first act, a very prominent per- 
sonage, but try as hard as one might, he 
could not positively define Forman's position 
in the Larrabee household. Nor did he learn 
it until after the first act was dead and 
buried and the second act was well under 
way. There were half a dozen things, which 
one might surmise about Forman, but he 
could not positively place him as Holmes's 
coworker until his intimate relations with the 
detective were divulged in the second act. 
Mr. Gillette ignored the dramatic canon with- 
out suffering any manifest inconvenience, 
largely, I think, because of the keen atten- 
tion that was centred in Sherlock Holmes, 



102 Famous Actors. 

which made minor considerations of little 
importance, and, too, because of the vast 
faith one had in Holmes's powers of obser- 
vation and deduction, which made not at all 
surprising the amount of information he pos- 
sessed regarding the Larrabee household. 

The acting of " Sherlock Holmes " was in 
many particulars as remarkable as the play. 
It, too, was idealised to the point of unreal- 
ity, and it was electrical with strained intent- 
ness. Most of the characters seemed to be 
carrying sticks of dynamite around in their 
pockets and momentarily expecting an ex- 
plosion. Supremely in evidence in Holmes 
himself was Mr. Gillette's unaccountable 
knack of focussing all the interest on himself 
without seeming to do anything of the kind. 
Holmes was a series of eloquent silences, — a 
chap of the most uncanny fascination, who 
never did anything until he had to, and who, 
when he did do anything, always did some- 
thing worth while. The result was that one 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes." 103 

became so afraid that he might miss some- 
thing which Holmes did, that he watched 
Holmes continually, not daring to look away 
lest the detective might seize that opportu- 
nity for springing one of his only occasional 
actions. While it was true that Mr. Gillette 
acted Sherlock Holmes in the same general 
style that he did the Yankee officer in 
" Secret Service," it was true, too, that 
Sherlock Holmes was a thoroughly distinct 
and thoroughly individualised characterisation. 
One cannot observe Mr. Gillette, the 
player, as the central figure in one of Mr. 
Gillette's plays without reflecting how wholly 
good it is for an actor to be his own drama- 
tist. This idealistic condition was forced 
home in the first act of " Sherlock Holmes," 
when one watched sympathetically five faith- 
ful players working with might and main for 
fully ten minutes, providing for Mr. Gillette, 
in the person of Sherlock Holmes, an im- 
pressive and effective entrance. And it 



104 Famous Actors. 

was an effective entrance, — let there be no 
doubt regarding that, — effective from the 
moment that Mrs. Larrabee peeped behind 
the picture and announced that a tall, thin 
man was on the doorstep, to the moment 
when Holmes pulled off his overcoat and 
seemingly settled himself on the uneasy 
Larrabees for the night. Not that the 
tenseness of the situation was ever so 
slightly relaxed after this amusing manoeu- 
vre, — quite the contrary, for still to come 
were sizzling points of interest ; but the 
formal "entrance" was completed when 
Holmes removed his coat. 

Gillette, the actor, is a strange being, 
whom every one that has written on the 
drama during the past fifteen years has tried 
to explain, and whom no one has as yet suc- 
ceeded to any appreciable extent in getting 
on paper. Mr. Gillette has in his portrait 
gallery four characters, — Rev. Robert Spaul- 
ding of "The Private Secretary," Billings, 



Gillette and " Sherlock Holmes!' 105 

the cheerful liar of "Too Much Johnson," 
Captain Thorne of " Secret Service," and 
Sherlock Holmes. Naturally, Mr. Gillette 
himself being tall and lean and lank, all four 
of these personages are tall and lean and 
lank. Except for this superficial resemblance 
to the others, the Rev. Mr. Spaulding might 
be cut out. He was unique and not to be 
compared with any one or anything else. In 
two apparent particulars Billings, Captain 
Thorne, and Holmes were very similar. 
They all were mighty smokers, and they 
all were admirably cool under every sort of 
trying circumstance. Beyond these three 
points, however, physique, tobacco, and cool- 
ness, there was not an item of resemblance 
between them. Nor was their individuality 
a mere surface cloak that could be removed 
and examined at leisure. This individuality 
was bred in the bone ; it was part of the 
fibre of character. Therefore it was com- 
pletely beyond analysis. One can say what 



io6 Famous Actors. 

a person is, but he cannot say why he is. 
One knows that Billings was neither Thorne 
nor Holmes. One knows that under no con- 
ditions would he mistake Thorne for Holmes. 
That they were different he had absolute 
knowledge ; how they were different — be- 
yond the minor facts that they did different 
things and lived in different environments — 
he found impossible to declare. 

It follows, therefore, however much we 
may limit Mr. Gillette's range of emotional 
expression, we must give him credit for a 
peculiar and mysterious versatility in char- 
acter delineation, — a strange and inexplicable 
histrionic quality that enables him constantly 
to maintain an insistent, strikingly unique, 
and seemingly fixed personality, and at the 
same time to project an impersonation that is 
unmistakably individualised. His range of 
expression may be limited. He may not 
be able to voice moral precepts with sin- 
cerity, and h§ may be unimpressive as a 



Gillette and "Sherlock Holmes." 107 

lover ; but within his range he is a marvel 
of vividness, of directness, of economy of 
effort, of dramatic force, of perfect self- 
poise, of constant command of resources, of 
thorough conviction. 

As before intimated, a large proportion 
of the success of Mr. Gillette, the actor, has 
been due to the skill, the ingenuity, and the 
theatrical cleverness of Mr. Gillette, the play- 
maker. It is perfectly plain that Dramatist 
Gillette has a thorough understanding of 
Actor Gillette, and this fortunate, and not 
altogether common circumstance enables the 
two to work together with inspiring harmony. 



CHAPTER VII. 

EDWIN ARDEN. 

One of the notable characterisations of 
the Maude Adams production of Edmond 
Rostand's "L'Aiglon" was the Metternich 
of Edwin Arden. This character was Ros- 
tand's " dens ex machinal It represented 
fate, the constant, foreboding shadow that 
continuously encompassed, with sombre men- 
ace, the pitifully weak figure of the struggling 
Napoleon. Metternich's attitude toward the 
duke was very like the attitude of the con- 
ventional villain of melodrama toward the 
hero. Yet Metternich was not a villain. 
Although always forced outside one's sym- 
pathy, by his opposition to the Duke of 
Reichstadt, Metternich was, nevertheless, 
108 




EDWIN ARDEN 
As Metternich in " L'Aiglon." 



Edwin Arden. 109 

representative of a patriotism that was thor- 
oughly ideal. The fact that one disliked 
the things that Metternich's patriotism com- 
pelled him to do, should not blind one to the 
obvious sincerity and unselfishness of the 
diplomat's motives. That Metternich per- 
sistently thwarted the Eaglet's ambition to 
reign as Emperor of France was true, but 
Metternich's reasons for acting as he did 
were never personal. Indeed, it was open 
to suspicion that as a man he was not with- 
out a certain fondness for Napoleon's son ; 
but as a diplomat and as Prime Minister of 
Austria he believed it his highest duty 
rigorously to check even the feeblest at- 
tempts of the Napoleon spirit to make itself 
felt. 

Metternich's desire was to rule the duke 
with kindness, and that the inevitable con- 
flict with the duke's ambition might be post- 
poned as long as possible, Metternich did 
everything in his power to keep his charge 



no Famous Actors. 

in ignorance of the enflaming glories of his 
father's history. When this condition of 
ignorance was outgrown, Metternich tried 
argument and subtle cunning. These ac- 
complishing nothing, brutal force alone re- 
mained, and in the dreadful scene before 
the mirror, Metternich played his last trump- 
card. He relentlessly revealed to the quiv- 
ering morsel of humanity, held captive by 
the awful power of unmanly fear, every 
weakness of heritage and every fault of 
character. Finally, after the duke's death, 
which followed crushed hope and defeated 
ambitions, it was Metternich who summed 
up the tragic and pathetic futility of the 
Eaglet's life-struggle in the words, "Clothe 
him in his Austrian uniform." 

Personally, I did not realise in full the 
excellence of Mr. Arden's presentation of 
Metternich until I had a chance to compare 
it with the decidedly less effective and 
worthy Metternich of Desjardin, who acted 



Edwin Arden. m 

the part in the Bernhardt production of 
"L'Aiglon." It is possible that Mr. Arden 
erred a trifle on the side of theatricalism, — 
he was, perhaps, a bit too smooth, too pol- 
ished, too self-possessed; but, on the other 
hand, he did give to Metternich undeniable 
distinction, and that was vital to the part. 
Mr. Arden's Metternich, too, was thoroughly 
impersonal. His Metternich was relentless in 
stifling the Duke of Reichstadt's aspirations 
simply and solely because, as Prime Minister 
of Austria, he knew that Austria's interests 
demanded that these ambitions should be 
stifled. Mr. Arden's Metternich was a 
whole-souled patriot. 

Desjardin lowered Metternich's idealism 
very perceptibly. He made Metternich very 
much of a small-minded man, and very little 
of a far-seeing, unselfish prime minister. 
Metternich, according to Desjardin's view 
of the case, had a strong personal feeling 
against the duke. He owed him a grudge, 



112 Famous Actors. 

hated the lad for himself, and feared him, 
moreover, because he was the son of his 
father. The mirror scene in the French 
presentation showed a Metternich gloating 
in a brutal revenge ; in the American presen- 
tation this scene was on a far higher plane, 
— it showed a Metternich performing a 
hateful duty for his country's sake. 

Edwin Hunter Pendleton Arden was born 
in St. Louis, Missouri, on February 13, 1864. 
He received a common school education, 
after which, when he was about sixteen or 
seventeen years old, he decided to take 
Horace Greeley's advice and go West. The 
experience that he piled up in that section 
of the country in a short time was some- 
thing marvellous. He began as a mine 
helper, next tried cow - punching, and was 
successively a clerk, a politician, a newspaper 
reporter, and a theatrical manager. Thus 
it will be seen that Mr. Arden climbed on 
the stage through the box-office, a most un- 



Edwin Arden. 113 

usual proceeding. Many actors have become 
managers, but few managers have become 
actors. 

Mr. Arden's first professional appearance 
on the stage was made in Chicago, in 1882, 
with the Thomas W. Keene company, and 
the next three years were passed in various 
companies, a part of the time in the stock 
organisation of the Boston Museum, where 
he acted small parts, and in the Madison 
Square Company of New York. Then Mr. 
Arden learned that he could write plays as 
well as act them, and the following nine 
years of his life were spent as a star in sen- 
sational melodramas, of which he was either 
the sole or part author. These were " The 
Eagle's Nest," "Barred Out/' and "Raglan's 
Way." Following this experience, as a 
member of William H. Crane's company, 
Mr. Arden created the part of the wicked 
Kentuckian, Mason Hix, when Franklin 
Fyles's melodramatic comedy, " The Gov- 



114 Famous Actors. 

ernor of Kentucky," was produced in Balti- 
more, Maryland, on January 18, 1896. 

Mr. Arden's skill in light comedy was 
admirably shown by his playing of Oliver 
West, the much-harassed husband in " Be- 
cause She Loved Him So," the capital farce 
which William Gillette adapted from the 
French, and which was first acted in New 
Haven, Connecticut, on October 28, 1898. 
This play was a model of adaptation, by the 
way, and, from the French original, which 
may not have been, but which probably was, 
exceedingly spicy, Mr. Gillette made a full- 
blooded English farce, that did not demand 
a troupe of ground and lofty tumblers for its 
proper exploitation, that was without vulgar- 
ity, and which was, even with these manifold 
virtues, excellent sport. Mr. Arden dis- 
played a light comedy style that was polished 
and easy, yet full of life and vim. Moreover, 
he had the estimable quality of absolute 
seriousness, which gave added comic power 



Edwin Arden. 115 

to all his scenes that bordered on the farcical- 
tragic. 

In August, 1899, Mr. Arden returned to 
starring, producing in Rochester, New York, 
a melodrama called " Zorah," of which he 
was the author. This play was placed in 
Moscow, and most of the characters were 
Russian Jews. The main interest centred 
around the love of Israel Francos, a young 
rabbi, played by Mr. Arden, for Zorah, daugh- 
ter of Mordecai Strakosch, although there 
was a secondary romance in which two 
Americans were the main factors. The 
drama was extremely sensational, besides 
being involved and complicated in plot. It 
never survived a Chicago engagement, though, 
had not Mr. Arden's eyesight failed him, 
compelling his retirement from work for the 
rest of the season, there might have been a 
different story to tell. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

richard mansfield's henry v. 

Richard Mansfield's first performance 
of William Shakespeare's rarely acted drama, 
" King Henry V.," was given at the Garden 
Theatre, New York City, on October 3, 1900. 
The production was an immediate success, 
and was finely patronised during a long run. 
After leaving New York, Mr. Mansfield 
appeared as King Henry in the principal 
theatrical centres of the East and Middle 
West, receiving everywhere more general 
commendation than had been given any of 
his previous ventures. His revival of " Henry 
V." was, indeed, an astonishing mechanical 
achievement. Moreover, the performance 
itself, taken as a whole, was one of the most 
116 



RICHARD MANSFIELD. 



Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 117 

satisfactory of a Shakespearian play that I 
ever saw. There were individual faults in 
abundance, but nearly all of these could be 
traced to an inability to read Shakespearian 
verse. Thus they could be fastened on com- 
paratively few of the players. The actors 
with prose speeches or with no speeches at 
all were drilled with such care and with such 
intelligence that they could scarcely have 
gone wrong if they had tried. 

In sequence of scenes Mr. Mansfield, in 
his acting version of " King Henry V.," fol- 
lowed the original play closely enough. 
Naturally he cut out speeches and even whole 
episodes with a liberal hand, as was neces- 
sary, not only to bring the action within the 
time-limit of the modern theatre, but also to 
prevent boredom on the part of the spectator. 
Chorus introduced the action, and Mans- 
field's Act I. included Act I. of the original, 
and the first three scenes of the original Act 
II., Chorus being brought in once more be- 



n8 Famous Actors. 

fore the Southampton scene. The Mansfield 
act ended with the departure of Nym, Bar- 
dolph, and Pistol to join Henry's army, the 
Boy's speech, beginning, " As young as I am, 
I have observed these three swashers," being 
used to bring down the curtain. The last 
part of Act II. and the first part of Act III. 
of the original, formed the Mansfield Act II., 
which opened in the palace of Charles VI. of 
France. Then followed Chorus and the 
scenes before Harfleur, King Charles's inter- 
view with the English ambassador, the Eng- 
lish camp at Picardy, the act ending with 
Henry's dismissal of the French herald and 
these lines spoken by the English king : 

" Beyond this river we'll encamp ourselves, 
And on to-morrow, bid them march away." 

Chorus introduced the Mansfield Act III., 
speaking the prologue to Act IV. of the orig- 
inal, "Now entertain conjecture for a time." 
The Dauphin's tent at Agincourt was first 



Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 119 

shown, and then came the English camp 
before dawn, and the various scenes of the 
battle. This act included practically the 
whole of the original Act IV. Mansfield's 
fourth act was devoted entirely to a spec- 
tacular representation of Henry's return to 
London, the only words spoken being part 
of the prologue to the original Act V., re- 
cited by Chorus. The scene showing the 
French Princess Katherine trying to learn 
English from the equally French Alice was 
transferred from Act III. of the original, and 
used as the first scene of Mansfield's Act V. 
Henry's wooing followed apace. Fluellen's 
cudgelling of Pistol was, of course, retained, 
and Mr. Mansfield ended the play with an 
interpolated spectacular processional, the es- 
pousal of Henry and Katherine. 

In this admirable arrangement of the play 
there was but one serious discrepancy to be 
noticed. That came from following Kath- 
erine's French lesson so closely by Henry's 



120 Famous Actors. 

wooing. One moment the French princess 
knew no English at all. The next moment 
she was stumbling around in the language 
with respectable ease. However, when one 
balanced this single contradiction against the 
difficulties that Mr. Mansfield overcame in 
presenting a comprehensive and smoothly 
acting version of this massive war spectacle, 
it really amounted to nothing. 

On so high a plane of general excellence 
was the production conceived and presented, 
that it would be unfair to pick any particular 
bit to exploit. All was remarkably fine, even 
the humble "front" scenes, which ordinarily 
are sacrificed to the full stage sets. In Act 
I., one was impressed with the unique throne 
picture, which had, however, from the audi- 
tor's standpoint, disadvantages as well as 
advantages. ' Spreading across the full back 
of the stage as it did, it made a splendid sug- 
gestion of bigness; but it also lost to the 
listeners the whole of the archbishop's 



Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 12 1 

speech, for that worthy, in addressing the 
king, was obliged to talk with his back to 
the house. In this same act, very effective 
was the quay at Southampton. In Act II., 
the scene before Harfleur was the most strik- 
ing. Act III. was rich in spectacle. Finely 
contrasted in two scenes, one following the 
other, were the riotous gaiety and boasting 
in the French camp before the battle of 
Agin court and the sober seriousness in the 
English camp. Most dramatic pictorially 
was the tableau representing the battle it- 
self. Act IV., the home-coming of the king, 
was all for the eye, and this, too, at the end, 
furnished another splendid and inspiring ta- 
bleau. No less gorgeous was the espousal 
scene, which ended the play. 

In his introduction to the " Richard Mans- 
field Acting Version of King Henry V.," Mr. 
Mansfield discoursed to considerable length 
on his conception of Henry's character. In 
brief, Mr. Mansfield's ideas were that Henry 



122 Famous Actors. 

must at first reflect the Prince Hal of " King 
Henry IV.," Part II. ; must be youthful, 
debonair, gracious, and yet with new-born 
kingliness, tact, and statecraft. In the 
scene at Southampton, Mr. Mansfield found 
the first notes of melancholy and pathos, 
and throughout the succeeding passages Mr. 
Mansfield saw Henry as the leader of men, 
as the eloquent and forceful pleader, as the 
royal philosopher, as the trusting Christian, 
and as the manly lover. In this same inter- 
esting introduction, Mr. Mansfield also told 
why he produced " Henry V." "The in- 
ducements that led me to produce ' Henry 
W were a consideration of its healthy and 
virile tone . . . the nobility of its language 
. . . the lesson it teaches of godliness, hon- 
our, loyalty, courage, cheerfulness, and per- 
severance ; its beneficial influence upon the 
young and old ; the opportunity it affords 
for a pictorial representation of the costumes 
and armour, manners and customs of that 



Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 123 

interesting period, and perhaps a desire to 
prove that the American stage, even under 
difficulties, is quite able to hold its own artis- 
tically with the European." 

" Henry V." cannot properly be called a 
play, nor is it worthy of being named an epic, 
as some enthusiasts have designated it. The 
low comedy scenes with their unheroic prose 
— even the verse itself, which is more often 
lyric than narrative — rob the work of all 
semblance to the epic. Its chief dramatic 
value comes from the thoroughness with 
which the character of the famously popu- 
lar Henry V. is set forth. As some one has 
said, in him Shakespeare represents his ideal 
of kingliness. Indeed, the dramatist appar- 
ently has no direct interest in any other per- 
sonage in the work except the Welshman, 
Fluellen, whose deep-seated sincerity, hidden 
behind the mask of the loquacious martinet, 
attracted Shakespeare mightily. However, 
with Henry and Fluellen out of the case, it 



124 Famous Actors, 

is readily perceived that the poet's main pur- 
pose was to fire the patriotism of the Eng- 
lishman. " Henry V." is a great summing 
up of a national spirit, and a championing of 
national ideas, even in their narrowness. In 
this play Shakespeare's view-point is distinctly 
insular. 

As a satirical friend of mine remarked, 
" Henry V." is a play not likely to add 
greatly to Mr. Shakespeare's reputation. 
What a howling popular success it must 
have been, though, when it was acted in 
London for the first time on some favoured 
evening between April 15 and September 
28, 1599! Without doubt it moved the 
ancient populace as mightily as a modern 
sensational melodrama, with real soldiers 
from the Philippines, moves the gallery god 
of to-day ; more so, probably, for the Shake- 
spearian gallery god — his home was in the pit 
in those days — could not have been sophisti- 
cated even to the slight degree of his modern 



Richard Mansfield' s Henry V. 125 

prototype. How the robustious actor, with 
leather lungs, roared out his poetic defiance 
of the scurvy French, amid the inspiring 
plaudits of the hard-handed men of London ! 
Imagine the "quality," smiling supercil- 
iously, but deigning, nevertheless, to acknowl- 
edge the Shakespearian jingoism with genteel 
clappings of the hands ! Did they shout 
" Bravo ! " in those days, I wonder, regarding 
such vociferation as a mark of superior intel- 
ligence ? Consider, too, the riotous laughter 
aroused by the Shakespearian low comedy, 
with its broad, insistent humour, the shouts 
of merriment at the strutting Pistol, at the 
pea-in-a-bladder Nym, and at the worthy 
Bardolph, serious-minded as the up-to-date 
"sport," when he discusses wisely the prow- 
ess of his favourite professional bruiser. 
Omit not from the reckoning the Shake- 
spearian appeal to the pseudo-religious in- 
stinct, evidently as prevalent four hundred 
years ago as it is in these days of "The 



126 Famous Actors. 

Christian " and "Ben Hur." Breathe the 
truth gently, for it is nigh unto heresy : 
" Henry V." certainly was built to hit the 
popular-priced audience of its day a knock- 
out blow. 

Because " Henry V." was devised for 
hurrah purposes, it was able to stand a 
spectacular revival such as Mr. Mansfield 
gave it. Indeed, it demanded exactly that 
sort of treatment to make it bearable on 
the modern stage. We are not especially 
interested in Shakespearian glorification of 
old England, but we do like vivid pictures ; 
and a better foundation for a glorious specta- 
cle never was invented. Mr. Mansfield amply 
proved that. Moreover, one watched the 
pictorial " Henry V." with an approving 
conscience. For was it not Shakespeare, 
and therefore eminently edifying ? There 
was, to be sure, for the serious-minded, the 
character of Henry V., and there was, too, 
the poetry, fresh, jubilant, spontaneous ; but 



Richard Mansfield 's Henry V. 127 

neither Henry as a character study, nor 
Shakespeare as a poet, count very heavily 
when this play is acted. It is a spectacle, 
— it must be a spectacle, — first, last, and all 
the time. If you want to study the character 
of Henry, better by far do it in your library. 
If you want to enjoy the poetry, better by 
far read it by yourself. 

There are any number of fine-sounding, 
spirited, and richly declamatory speeches in 
" Henry V.," but there is absolutely no dra- 
matic development. There is also a great 
deal of turning this way and that — for all 
the world as if he were a tailor's model — 
of a personage called Henry V. But there 
is no searching examination of the Henry V. 
character. The king is exhibited in various 
phases — ambitiously resolved on war ; gen- 
erously and pityingly forgiving, even though 
he must punish, those who have turned 
traitor to him ; gallantly and tactfully lead- 
ing his soldiers to victory; forcibly impress- 



128 Famous Actors, 

ing his enemies with the inflexibility of his 
purpose ; courageous in the face of great 
odds, steadfast always in his faith, but never 
Pharisaical, loving a wholesome jest and un- 
consciously democratic, a generous victor 
and a modest, manly lover. In all these 
lights is Henry displayed, but the illumina- 
tion almost invariably comes from without 
rather than from within. Henry says things 
which show him to be this, that, or the 
other, but he rarely does things that make 
the motive behind the action apparent with- 
out explanatory words. 

A play like " Hamlet " works from within 
outward, and one is chiefly interested, not in 
what Hamlet does, but in what he is. There- 
fore scenery, costumes, and processionals are 
of comparatively little importance. Modest 
and unobtrusive and harmonious, they assist 
the imagination. The instant, however, 
scenic effects withdraw the attention from 
the action, that instant they become a posi- 



Richard Mansfield' s Henry V. 129 

tive detriment to an artistic production. 
With " Henry V." the case is wholly differ- 
ent. There being no compelling dramatic 
action to be nursed and nurtured, no char- 
acter to be carefully and logically unfolded, 
the Shakespearian spectacular scheme can 
be loaded with the full burden of modern 
stagecraft, and the Shakespearian poetry and 
humour will be as precious gems sparkling 
with brilliancy through it all. The producer, 
however, must avoid the blunder of sacrific- 
ing speed for bigness, for even the most 
gorgeous and massive of stage pictures can- 
not compensate for slowness. Mr. Mans- 
field, it should be stated, attained the most 
marvellous celerity in shifting scenery. 
Scene followed scene with swiftness and 
accuracy, and the rests between the acts 
were cut down to the very last second. The 
result was a Shakespearian production that, 
in spite of its tremendously heavy staging, 
did not impress one as being overweighted 



130 Famous Actors. 

with settings. The action was continuous 
and without drag, and the interest was con- 
stantly maintained. 

There were two ways in which one might 
consider the acting of this play. He might 
take the company as a whole, ignoring indi- 
viduals. Then he must praise highly. The 
general average of acting was unusually good. 
But there was reason for this. Compara- 
tively few of the players, with the exception 
of Mr. Mansfield, had much verse to speak. 
They had been drilled, drilled, drilled, until 
they knew perfectly their places in the pic- 
tures, and, inasmuch as they did not have 
to speak, their capable action enabled one 
to carry away the idea that he had seen an 
exceptionally well rounded performance of a 
Shakespearian play. The modern actor has 
many good qualities, but the ability to read 
Shakespearian verse is rarely one of them. 
Yet, the main thing in a Shakespearian pro- 
duction is to get the lines to the audience, — 



Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 131 

they are always good enough to make their 
own effects, if their meaning and intention 
can be made reasonably plain. Mr. Mans- 
field apparently recognised this, for he 
simplified the action in all instances where 
the interest was centred in what was being 
said rather than on what was being done. 
Scarcely any movement was permitted in 
many of the scenes, — those before Harfleur 
and those showing the English camp before 
the battle of Agincourt being examples. 

Mr. Mansfield himself was by no means 
above critical attention as a reader. His 
voice was not always pleasant, and his enun- 
ciation was often not as clear and distinct as 
one might have wished. He assuredly lacked 
the bell-like quality of tone that is so helpful 
to the speaker who would make every word 
understood. Nor was Mr. Mansfield's han- 
dling of the verse anywhere near perfect. 
He was inclined to be jerky, and to chop his 
lines into sections. But Mr. Mansfield had 



132 Famous Actors. 

the saving grace of authority. He spoke 
impressively, if not perfectly, and he spoke 
intelligently even when one could not under- 
stand what he said, — which was something 
of a paradox. Moreover, he exhaled that 
magic weaver of spells, the dramatic and 
theatric atmosphere. One actor in Mr. 
Mansfield's company really did read well, — 
James L. Carhart, who played the Duke 
of Exeter. He delivered the defiances of 
Henry to Charles of France with a richness 
of elocutionary power and a boldness of 
sweeping gesture that fairly gave wings to 
the words. Mr. Carhart, understand me, 
was not at all of the declamatory school. 
He was simply a good reader, who did not 
look on Shakespearian verse as something 
with which to juggle. 

Style was thoroughly characteristic of Mr. 
Mansfield's " Henry V." He looked and 
acted and felt the king. He gave the air of 
distinction, of royalty, of being to the manner 




Copyright 1900 by Rose and Sands. 

RICHARD MANSFIELD 
As Henry V. in " King Henry V." 



Richard Mansfield' s Henry V. 133 

born. One might say that he did not in 
personal appearance fully meet the ideal of 
the handsome King Harry, but that was a 
minor and superficial detail. Mr. Mansfield 
realised the ideal mentally, and after he had 
accomplished that, the matter of looks was a 
mere bagatelle. 

Mr. Mansfield's most telling speech was 
the one to the Mayor of Harfleur, demanding 
the surrender of the town. This was deliv- 
ered wholly without heroics, without even a 
single gesture, if I recall correctly ; but the 
right feeling was behind each word, conse- 
quently every phrase counted. The St. 
Crispin's Day speech was vivid. Very beau- 
tiful was the prayer before the battle, and 
right stern was the " Once more into the 
breach, dear friends," harangue. There was 
splendid royalty and deep sentiment in the 
scene of the unmasking of the traitors, and 
the wooing of Katherine was permeated with 
delicious comedy. 



134 Famous Actors. 

One of the most popular impersonations 
in the Mansfield production of " Henry V." 
was the Fluellen of A. G. Andrews. Before 
finding any fault with Mr. Andrews's con- 
ception of the character, it is but fair to 
state that he acted the part strictly according 
to theatrical tradition, which holds that the 
Welshman should be a man of small physique, 
with a squeaky voice and a general atmos- 
phere of meanness, — the direct opposite in 
personal appearance and mannerisms to the 
bold, intrepid, honest man behind the mask. 

That this is the highest conception of 
the character, especially as an acting part, I 
do not believe, any more than I believe that 
the traditional representation of Polonius in 
11 Hamlet," as an idiot in his dotage, is cor- 
rect. Polonius was egotistical, vain, and 
worldly. He was an ass, but not a silly ass. 
Polonius was the trusted counsellor of the 
crafty Claudius, who, whatever may have been 
his moral failings, was clever enough not to 



Richard Mansfield's Henry V. 135 

have chosen a puttering, foolish old man to 
run matters in the kingdom of Denmark. 
Polonius's advice to his son Laertes distinctly 
showed that this traditional clown was at least 
a man of sound politic sense. So far from 
being an antique, shaky at the knees, Polonius 
was the most accomplished of courtiers. 

Henry himself calls Fluellen a man of 
"much care and valour,'' but "out of fash- 
ion/' and the king's respect for his eccentric 
countryman is plainly displayed in the license 
that he permits in Fluellen, who is never 
rebuked for speaking his mind, even when in 
doing so he grows offensively loquacious in 
the king's presence. Hippisley in Garrick's 
time is reported to have acted Fluellen with- 
out playfulness and without caprice, and 
those who saw the Rignold production of 
" Henry V.," twenty-five years ago, recall the 
Fluellen of Mr. Thorn as a personage of 
unmistakable dignity. 

The sincere, brave nature of Fluellen be- 



136 Famous Actors, 

hind the Welshman's caprices and awkward 
eccentricities should be plainly revealed by 
the actor, and this, as the character came to 
me, was just what Mr. Andrews did not do. 
His Fluellen appeared to be wholly ridiculous, 
without weight and without dignity, a ludi- 
crously conceited and strutting bantam cock, 
a boaster and a braggart. The outward 
characteristics were precisely those of the 
man himself. One wondered that Henry 
bore with him. This Fluellen was amusing, 
to be sure ; he was excellent low comedy. 
But he never reached above the level of low 
comedy. Mr. Andrews reaped his laughs at 
the expense and degradation of a character, 
in the drawing of which Shakespeare took 
much pains. I do not intend to imply that 
Fluellen should be made ponderously serious, 
though it should be ever remembered that 
Fluellen always took himself with profound 
seriousness. He should be acted so as to 
win for him one's respect. 









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WILLIAM FAVERSHAM 

As Lord Algy, with Joseph Wheelock, Jr., as Morley, in 
M Lord and Lady Algy." 



CHAPTER IX. 

WILLIAM FAVERSHAM. 

A new quality was developed in William 
Faversham, who for a number of seasons had 
been pursuing a pleasant, but scarcely dis- 
tinguished way, as the leading man of the 
Empire Theatre Company of New York, 
when the opportunity came to him to make 
public his wonderfully vivid character study 
of Lord Algy in R. C. Carton's thoroughly 
delightful light comedy, " Lord and Lady 
Algy." Mr. Faversham may be said in this 
part to have abandoned for the first time self- 
consciousness, and the most distressing of 
his fixed and illusion-dispelling mannerisms. 
One of the worst of these was the Faversham 
proposal of marriage. No one, who ever saw 
*37 



138 Famous Actors. 

Faversham telling a girl how much he loved 
her, can forget how he used to hunch up his 
shoulders while he breathed passionate noth- 
ings into the young woman's left ear. I 
never could understand — I do not now, for 
that matter — why, with Faversham, there 
always was such close connection between 
hunch-up shoulders and undying affection. 
However, it is fact that Mr. Faversham's 
most artistic work has been done in two 
plays in which he had no proposals to make, 
— in "Lord and Lady Algy," and in Leo 
Trevor's "Brother Officers/' 

John Hinds, in this latter comedy, marks 
the apex of Mr. Faversham's achievements 
up to the present time. Though the play 
itself was not on a par with the Carton prod- 
uct, Hinds was a more weighty article than 
Lord Algy. It is interesting to notice that 
both of these were character parts, a fact 
which makes pertinent the theory that Mr. 
Faversham had previously been persistently 



William Faversham. 139 

missing his vocation. There seems no rea- 
sonable cause to doubt that he is a far better 
character actor than he is a juvenile leading 
man. 

" Lord and Lady Algy " was a wonder- 
fully compact little play. Except in the second 
act, when extra characters were necessary to 
give colour to the fancy-dress ball, not a 
person nor an incident was wasted. The 
construction at times was a little too appar- 
ent, — the business with the photograph in 
the first act, for example, — and to this lack 
of subtilty was due to a considerable extent, 
I think, the impression of farcing that many 
received. This impression was deepened by 
Lord Algy's drunken scene. Intoxication is 
so closely associated with farce that an un- 
discriminating mind might easily have failed 
to distinguish between Faversham's intoxi- 
cated Lord Algy, conceived in a comedy 
vein, and the conventional " drunk " of the 
stage, conceived in a spirit of burlesque. 



140 Famous Actors. 

The author's mistake was in making the 
scene so prominent. Naturally, it would 
have been merely an incident, and as such it 
would have taken its proper place in the 
comedy without betraying its farcical ten- 
dencies ; but the author expanded it into a 
situation — indeed, almost into an entire act. 
Mr. Faversham's surprising virtuosity and 
idealised realism kept alive the comedy 
spirit and at the same time prevented bore- 
dom. Throughout the whole play Mr. Faver- 
sham's acting was discriminating, spontaneous, 
and tempered with a fine sense of humour. 
He was distinguished in method, resourceful 
and varied in expression, and reposeful in 
action. His work was at all times finely 
finished. 

The atmosphere of "Lord and Lady 
Algy" was something that the average 
theatregoer in this country had to accept as 
a fact rather than recognise as a condition. 
We really have no conception of the horse- 



William Faversham. 141 

racing gentleman as a type, for horse-racing 
is not an institution over here as it is in 
England. What we could appreciate in 
" Lord and Lady Algy " was the human 
nature of the characters who moved in this 
strange environment. The essential truth, 
the fundamental sincerity, and the unprovin- 
cialism of the character drawing, alone made 
it possible for the comedy to appeal success- 
fully to a wide and varied constituency. It 
did not seem to me that " Lord and Lady 
A ] gy " was accepted merely because it was 
good fun, — that was, in the farcical spirit. 
The work made a deeper impression than that. 
While there were characters which were bur- 
lesqued in spirit — the Marquis of Quarmby 
was one — and situations which were evolved 
simply for the laugh that was in them, the play, 
as a whole, reflected the genuine comedy spirit. 
As I take it, the difference between farce 
and comedy is, in a final deduction, merely 
one of feeling. Dryden stated the condition 



142 Famous Actors. 

approximately when he said that the persons 
and actions of a farce are all unnatural and 
the manners false. Surely, there was no such 
state of affairs in " Lord and Lady Algy." 
Lord Algy was not false even in that ridic- 
ulous scene of intoxication. Lady Algy, 
whose unconventionality and possible absurd- 
ity from our point of view made her seem 
forced and unnatural at times, radiated a 
womanliness far too deep for farcical treat- 
ment. As for Mawley Jemmett, the jockey, 
no finer comedy could be asked. 

The one thing that saved " Brother Offi- 
cers from mediocrity was the character crea- 
tion of Lieutenant John Hinds. This was 
something in the nature of a dramatic inspi- 
ration, and it did yeoman service in providing 
a first act of rich interest ; and, in conjunction 
with the development of wholly unexpected 
strength and beauty in the part of Baroness 
Roydon, it added a third act of singular 
pathetic power. 



William Faversham. 143 

A line on the playbill quoted from Tenny- 
son gave the key to John Hinds : " Here 
and there a cotter's babe is royal born by 
right divine/ ' From an environment on the 
criminal border line, this man Hinds had 
fought his way from the ranks to an army 
commission. His bravery had won him a 
Victoria Cross, and his manliness had gained 
him the greater victory of respect and honour 
among his fellow officers. The play — or, to 
be more exact, the last act of the play — 
showed his greatest victory of all, — the 
greatest victory a man or a woman may 
win, — the victory over self. Never mind if 
in " Brother Officers" this idealistic struggle 
was set forth with not the greatest skill, nor 
the greatest delicacy, nor the greatest sub- 
tilty. It was a worthy theme. That it 
might have been better done, is true, but 
that it was done at all, was infinitely to Mr. 
Trevor's credit. 

In this splendidly effective character Mr. 



144 Famous Actors. 



Faversham could hardly have failed to make 
a deep impression, and his acting reached 
farther beneath the surface than has often 
been the case. With the exception of his 
Lord Algy, which was light comedy, and 
therefore free from comparison with a 
straight comedy part like Hinds, Mr. Faver- 
sham has been accustomed to act himself, 
and, in so doing, he was on the verge of 
committing himself irredeemably to a series 
of uncomfortable histrionic habits. In Hinds, 
however, he got rid of these entirely. He 
"composed" his character in the first act 
with convincing clearness and with wonder- 
ful realism, and he clung to this composition 
with tenacity throughout the play. Hinds 
was a far different fellow in the last act than 
he was in the first. Mr. Faversham suc- 
ceeded in making this difference plain, and 
he succeeded in the far more difficult task of 
making it evident, as well, that Hinds was 
always Hinds — with a difference. Not often 



I 




WILLIAM FAVERSHAM 
As Lieut. John Hinds in " Brother Officers." 



William Faversham, 145 

is a harder problem presented to a player 
than that solved by Mr. Faversham in the 
first act. He had to show a man, absolutely 
uncultured externally, with no knowledge 
even of the most elementary social usages, 
and wholly without taste or breeding. Still 
he had to make apparent this man's inherent 
nobleness, his natural manliness, and his 
splendid sincerity. The best evidence that 
Mr. Faversham fulfilled these conditions was 
found in the profound pity that one felt for 
Hinds in all his social difficulties. I laughed 
at him, to be sure, and still I could not have 
felt more sorry for him. 

One of Dramatist Trevor's theatrical ex- 
pedients irritated me beyond measure ; it 
was so obvious a wrong to John Hinds, of 
whom I had grown exceedingly fond by the 
time the last act was reached. The situation 
was this : Hinds was in love with the pretty 
Baroness Roydon. She loved the weak- 
willed Lieutenant Pleydell, and he in turn 



146 Famous Actors, 

loved her. It was quite necessary that 
Hinds should get inside of this complicated 
ring of affection. He, of course, knew that 
he loved the baroness, but he was on the 
point of fooling himself with the idea that 
perhaps some day the young woman might 
love him. This was so utterly impossible that 
Mr. Trevor felt obliged to enlighten Hinds, 
in order to keep him from making a needless 
spectacle of himself, and also to give him a 
chance to be noble and leave the scene 
a willing sacrifice, and quite the biggest 
man in the play. 

How do you suppose the simple-minded 
Mr. Trevor accomplished Mr. Hinds's disillu- 
sionment ? In no other way than by the 
wholly absurd means of an overheard conver- 
sation. A certain Miss Johnson in the play, 
having in the course of the action engaged 
herself to marry an amusing comedy earl 
with narrow caste ideas, forthwith confided 
to her betrothed all the love-affairs of the 



William Faversham. 147 

household, while Hinds, sitting unseen in a 
big armchair, heard everything, — how he 
loved the baroness, but could never marry 
her in the world, because he would surely 
get on her nerves. "There are two kinds 
of men in the world," wisely decreed the 
little earl, "gentlemen and the rest." Hinds, 
as he told himself later, belonged to "the 
rest " in the earl's worldly and snobbish, but 
not wholly untruthful classification. This 
scene in " Brother Officers " was thorough 
"rot." Hinds may not have been a gentle- 
man within the earl's narrow limitations, but 
he was a man. He knew that he had no 
right to listen to a conversation about him- 
self and his friends, and he would not have 
listened. What right has an author to make 
one of his creations do a dishonourable act, 
wholly unlike the character as developed, 
simply to further the author's story ? It is 
almost as bad as teaching one's child to 
steal. 



148 Famous Actors. 

During almost the entire theatrical season 
of 1 900- 1 90 1, Mr. Faversham was ill, and 
consequently his only new impersonation of 
the year was his Henry Beauclerc, in the 
Empire Theatre revival of Victorien Sardou's 
" Diplomacy.' ' This production of the fa- 
mous drama was a thoroughly good one, but 
in no sense a wonderfully great one. It 
lacked in particular a strong Zicka, for Jessie 
Millward was only adequately melodramatic 
in the character. The ideal Zicka is as the- 
atrically brilliant as a municipal display of 
fireworks on a Fourth of July evening. Miss 
Millward did not attain that standard. Pos- 
sibly she tried to make Zicka natural. If 
she did, it was a mistake. Zicka is flaming 
red. 

" Diplomacy/' however, is a play that to 
a considerable extent acts itself. As ma- 
chinery it is superb. The plot is a marvel- 
lous theatrical conception, and its development 
is a masterpiece of invention. " Diplomacy " 



William Faversham. 149 

is interesting, too, in its way, after the bore- 
dom of explanations that are required in the 
first act to get the story in working order are 
over, and when Dora is not too overwhelm- 
ingly sentimental. But this interest — in my 
case at least — is similar to the interest that 
an engineer shows in an intricate specimen 
of machinery. I feel that Sardou's dramatic 
artisanship is on exhibition, that he is giving 
an exhibition of the mechanism of play -writing, 
explaining how episodes may be focussed into 
a climax, and how situations may be devel- 
oped to the greatest possible advantage. I 
am quite sure that he has forgotten all about 
the soul that a play must have to make it 
a living reality. For plays are like human 
beings in this, — that it is not the outward 
seeming which makes them what they are, 
but the inward feeling. 

Of course, in passing restrictions on 
* * Diplomacy,' ' one must remember that the 
drama was first acted in this country in 



150 Famous Actors. 

1885, and that all its clever tricks and de- 
vices, which were novel and effective through 
surprise when the play itself was new, have 
since been used by borrowing playwrights 
time and time again. Still, the genuine 
human quality in a play can never be lost, 
and it is therefore fair to assume, if " Diplo- 
macy " is unconvincing now, that it must 
have been unconvincing then. 

In the matter of character, " Diplomacy " 
is decidedly less original than in plot. 
Moreover, Sardou made practically no at- 
tempt at exposition. The personages in 
the drama were simply stated as facts, and 
then pushed into doing the work assigned 
them. In other words, the spectator's atten- 
tion was directed, not to what these men and 
women were, but to what they were doing. 
It was true that they were roughly classified, 
but their classification was distinctly theat- 
rical, — very broad and plain, but not deep 
nor subtle nor distinguished. One quickly 



William Faversham. 151 

summed them up something in this fashion : 
Henry Beauclerc, cool, calm, and collected, 
the balance-wheel of the action ; Julian Beau- 
clerc, warm-hearted, impulsive, and conse- 
quently idiotic ; Baron Stein, dialect diplomat, 
very blase and very shifty ; Zicka, world- 
against-her adventuress ; Dora, sentimental 
heroine, tender and tearful. 

The successful acting of such parts is — 
assuming that the actor be possessed of a 
fair technical equipment — - chiefly a matter 
of personality. Only through the force of 
his personal appeal can the player establish 
the semblance of an illusion or compel the 
slightest conviction. Especially is this true 
of those parts whose theatricalism is some- 
what below the surface. Thus Baron Stein, 
obviously a melodramatic figurehead, holds 
one by his very extravagance. He is so 
palpably impossible that the imagination takes 
a romantic delight in dressing him up as a 
Frankenstein possibility. But characters like 



152 Famous Actors. 

Henry, Julian, and Dora superficially parallel 
life, and unconsciously one compares the 
actors playing them with persons in real life. 
Then personality counts, for it is only through 
personality that sincerity can be felt. 

I liked Mr. Faversham's Henry Beauclerc, 
because I found the impersonation strongly 
imbued with this quality of sincerity. It is 
true that the actor's work was displeasing 
in certain respects. Often he swaggered in 
his walk in a manner strikingly suggestive of 
Lieutenant John Hinds in " Brother Officers." 
Again he was monotonous and stilted in ges- 
ture, drawling in voice and indistinct in 
enunciation. Yet Mr. Faversham displayed 
both authority and distinction in the forceful 
scenes, when, as master of the situation, Henry 
held and coolly played the trump-cards. 
Mr. Faversham was deliberate without being 
weighty, and calm without being ponderous. 
He suggested, by means of a frank smile 
that was wonderfully humanising, that Henry, 



William Faversham. 153 

while he may have been a diplomatist in a 
melodrama, was at heart a good fellow, and 
not at all the prig he appeared to be. Indeed, 
I am quite sure that it was this smile which 
saved Mr. Fa versham's characterisation from 
being positively the ordinary thing. 



CHAPTER X. 

STUART ROBSON IN " OLIVER GOLDSMITH." 

Stuart Robson produced " Oliver Gold- 
smith/ ' a three-act comedy by Augustus 
Thomas, in Albany, New York, on Novem- 
ber 30, 1899. Mr. Robson began that 
season very ambitiously, bringing out in 
Providence, Rhode Island, on September n, 
1899, "The Gadfly," a dramatisation by Ed- 
ward E. Rose of Mrs. Voynich's novel, in 
which he acted a serious character. The 
experiment was wholly a failure, not any 
more so, perhaps, because Mr. Robson tried 
to be serious, than because the play itself 
was wholly impossible. 

Possibly, for the reason that it had to be 
hurried to completion to meet an emergency^ 
154 




STUART ROBSOX 
As Oliver Goldsmith in " Oliver Goldsmith." 



Robson in "Oliver Goldsmith." 155 

though I do not know positively that this was 
a fact, " Oliver Goldsmith," "The Gadfly's " 
successor, was a curiously uneven product of 
dramatic workmanship. It struck one as 
unfinished in every way. The first act was 
remarkably good, fine old comedy in at- 
mosphere, rich in character studies, brisk, 
interesting, and ingenious in action ; but dis- 
tinction largely departed after this, leaving 
two-thirds of the play irritatingly inadequate. 
Mr. Thomas called " Oliver Goldsmith " a 
comedy, and if one bore in mind the indefi- 
niteness of all play classifications, comedy 
did as well for an identifying label as any- 
thing else. Mr. Thomas, however, would 
have been more correct, and at the same time 
fairer to himself, if he had escaped in some 
manner all the trammels of conventional 
dramatic writing that the terms comedy and 
play suggest. " Oliver Goldsmith " was in 
dramatic form, but it was, nevertheless, only 
in the broadest sense a play. I should de- 



156 Famous Actors. 

scribe it as a collection of character studies 
of certain personages prominent in literary, 
political, and theatrical history. That would 
be, it is true, a clumsy enough designation, 
but certainly the artistic measure of Mr. 
Thomas's work would have been more justly 
taken, if it had been in some manner indicated 
that in " Oliver Goldsmith " one was expected 
to interest himself wholly in persons as they 
were, and not in the least in what they did. 

I acknowledge that "Oliver Goldsmith " 
did try to tell some sort of a story, the main 
theme being Goldsmith's love for Mary Hor- 
neck ; but the plot, as far as vital interest or 
conviction regarding its probability were con- 
cerned, counted for little. Goldsmith was 
represented in the first act as mistaking the 
home of Mr. Featherstone for an inn, the 
episode giving him the idea which resulted 
in "She Stoops to Conquer.'* The second 
act showed a rehearsal of that famous comedy 
on the stage of the Covent Garden Theatre. 



Robson in "Oliver Goldsmith" 157 

The third act pictured Goldsmith in his pov- 
erty, desperately in debt to his landlady, and 
characteristically impractical in the expendi- 
ture of the little money that came to him. 
The play ended with Mary Horneck in Gold- 
smith's arms. Before the fall of the final 
curtain the poet spoke a "tag" about his 
health and the woman he loved, the meaning 
of which was not apparent. It probably was 
intended to convey the idea that, although 
Mr. Goldsmith was embracing Miss Horneck, 
he would not live long enough to make her 
his wife. 

In the course of his three acts Mr. Thomas 
introduced various encyclopediated incidents, 
anecdotes, and sayings connected with Gold- 
smith, and in this way mixed enough truth 
with his fiction to give his product at least a 
historical flavour. This method, of course, 
is perfectly legitimate when it is skilfully 
done. And it was skilfully done in the 
present case. Still, none of these things 



158 Famous Actors. 

made " Oliver Goldsmith " a play, for the 
chief interest in Mr. Thomas's work was not 
in the plot, nor in the theme, nor in the 
action, nor in the development of character. 
It was centred in the personages who ap- 
peared in the action ; and it was centred 
in them, not because they did entertaining 
things on the stage or displayed interesting 
traits, but because we knew that they were 
modelled after men and women of impor- 
tance and of individuality who had lived some 
two hundred and fifty years before. 

There is a difference in the view-point 
from which one regards the historical per- 
sonage on the stage and the dramatic char- 
acter standing boldly by himself without the 
antiquity " prop " or the convenient support 
of the enthusiastic hero-worshipper. The 
historical personage has at the start a lead- 
ing advantage in previously excited interest. 
His familiar name catches the attention, and 
if one be in the least unsophisticated, he finds 



Robson in "Oliver Goldsmith" 159 

himself anticipating with no little eagerness 
the impression that he expects to receive 
from the actor's counterfeit. But there all 
advantage ceases, for the historical personage, 
on the stage, having a reputation to live up 
to, is quite apt to be disappointing and disil- 
lusionising. One cannot help regarding the 
historical personage as an established fact, 
and one's main curiosity regarding such a 
character is the verifying of this fact. The 
purely imaginary dramatic character, on the 
contrary, comes to one replete with fresh 
and undetermined possibilities. It is a new 
friend, which may in time twine itself about 
one's heart and enshrine itself in one's affec- 
tions. It is unexplored human nature, a new 
and intensely fascinating document, mayhap, 
to be read and to be studied and to be 
thoughtfully considered. 

When one perceived Dr. Samuel Johnson's 
name on the playbill, he immediately pro- 
vided himself with a mental image of that 



160 Famous Actors. 

worthy and catalogued the facts that he 
knew regarding him, — that he wrote a dic- 
tionary, that he was probably a most intoler- 
able bore, that a spindle-shanked creature 
named Boswell always tagged him about like 
a faithful poodle, and that they always ad- 
dressed one another in the most respectful 
manner as "sir." Consequently, one's atten- 
tion was fixed, not on Doctor Johnson as a 
character in a play by Augustus Thomas, 
but on the historical Doctor Johnson ; and 
one wondered if Mr. H. A. Weaver, Sr., 
impersonating Doctor Johnson, would fill the 
idea of the old fossil, if he would look like 
Doctor Johnson, and talk and act like him. 
Exactly similar was the interest in Mr. Bos- 
well, the greatest echo that ever lived ; in 
Davy Garrick, the actor ; in Edmund Burke, 
the Irishman ; and in Oliver Goldsmith, the 
original Bohemian, and the greatest and the 
sincerest one of them all. Goldsmith was a 
Bohemian because he could not be anything 



Robs on in " Oliver Goldsmith." 161 

else, while most men are Bohemians because 
they are either fools or knaves. 

That it is quite possible to take a histor- 
ical personage and turn him into a dramatic 
character, was shown by Mr. Weaver in his 
presentation of Doctor Johnson. In this 
remarkable study the actor summed up the 
rich substance of nearly half a century of 
faithful playing of parts. In recreating a his- 
torical figure, it is not enough for the actor 
to be pictorially correct ; he must also get 
inside the original's personality, and must 
contrive to breathe forth the original's atmos- 
phere. Doctor Johnson has always been to 
me very much of an individuality, positively 
the superlative of boredom. Where the im- 
pression came from I do not know, unless 
because for a disagreeable school task, I once 
was forced to read Johnson's " Lives of the 
English Poets." I think of Doctor Johnson 
as a monstrosity of inflated egotism, of 
bumptious arrogance, and of intellect ponder- 



1 62 Famous Actors. 

ous and even inert, because of its own weight. 
Probably these notions do the great man 
injustice, and certain it is they are utterly 
lacking in reverence for this dead and buried 
giant of the eighteenth century, whose books 
— merciful dispensation — I do not have to 
read, whose didactically expounded wisdom I 
do not have to listen to, and whose laborious 
jokes I do not have to laugh at. 

Nevertheless, if I wronged the great Doc- 
tor Johnson, Mr. Weaver wronged him equally, 
for Mr. Weaver's Doctor Johnson was my 
Doctor Johnson in every point and particular. 
As a physical composition, this impersonation 
was no less remarkable than as a mental re- 
flection. Mr. Weaver looked Doctor John- 
son with strange insistency, — the hangdog 
mouth that suggested bodily disease, the 
peculiar, indescribable expression about the 
eyes that denoted settled conceit and inher- 
ent vanity, the creeping walk of the bodily 
indolent man of sedentary habits, and always 



Rob son in " Oliver Goldsmith." 163 

that exasperating trick of demanding first 
place and first attention as a right. I enjoyed 
this Doctor Johnson, — he was, with all his 
book-learning, palpably so gross and so mean 
and so small. He was wretchedly without 
inspiration. However much he might speak 
his admiration for artistic beauty, he never 
really felt the slightest emotional thrill from 
it. Still, you say, he was good to Oliver 
Goldsmith. Yes, as good as a Samuel John- 
son could be : he patronised genius, and patted 
himself on the back while doing it. 

In acting Oliver Goldsmith, Stuart Robson 
was surprisingly successful in making the 
Goldsmith personality assume the inevitable 
Robson mannerisms and emerge from the 
ordeal with the Goldsmith character still in 
evidence. Mr. Robson's impersonation was al- 
ways intelligent and often decidedly brilliant. 
Goldsmith's physical unloveliness was suffi- 
ciently indicated ; his awkwardness was made 
apparent without grotesque exaggeration, and 



164 Famous Actors. 

he was, naturally enough for play-acting pur- 
poses, endowed with a dry wit in repartee 
that, according to tradition, he by no means 
possessed. Mr. Robson, however, laboured 
under a tremendous disadvantage in not hav- 
ing been Oliver Goldsmith before he was 
Bertie the Lamb in "The Henrietta." I do 
not mean this as a slur on a conscientious and 
high-idealed actor. It is simply the formal 
statement of an evident fact. It seems amply 
proven that Mr. Robson cannot get away from 
his mannerisms, his rising and falling voice, 
his impossible elocution, his delayed gestures, 
and his uncouth postures. These peculiari- 
ties fitted Bertie perfectly, with the embar- 
rassing result that Mr. Robson has, to an 
extent, remained Bertie ever since. Now I 
believe that the Robson peculiarities were as 
thoroughly in harmony with a stage Oliver 
Goldsmith as they were with Bertie, but un- 
fortunately, eye and ear refused readily to 
follow reason in the matter. Oliver Gold- 



Robson in "Oliver Goldsmith" 165 

smith was unquestionably higher art than 
Bertie. Bertie was a farcical impression, a 
wonderfully vivid one, but still only an im- 
pression ; Goldsmith was a well-rounded con- 
ception, lacking, however, a distinct quality 
of pervading pathos that would have made it 
histrionically great. Mr. Robson could not 
be pathetic, and this defect in his artistic 
equipment robbed his Oliver Goldsmith of a 
measure of effectiveness, for the part as 
drawn by Mr. Thomas and as conceived by 
the actor, cried out for sympathetic tears. 



CHAPTER XL 

THE MELODRAMATIC JAMES O'NEILL. 

James O'Neill first appeared in "The 
Musketeers," adapted by Sidney Grundy 
from Alexandre Dumas's novel, " Les Trois 
Mousquetaires," at Montreal, Canada, on 
March 6, 1899. The play was originally 
produced in London on November 3, 1898, 
with Beerbohm Tree as D'Artagnan. This 
spectacular melodrama served Mr. O'Neill 
during the season of 1899- 1900, and it 
seemed as if by means of it Mr. O'Neill had 
at last shaken off that Old-Man-of-the-Sea, 
"Monte Cristo," which had so persistently 
clung to him for some fifteen years. It was 
not so to be, however, for in the fall of 1900 
again came into view the everlasting Edmond 
166 




JAMES O'NEILL 
As Edmond Dantes in M Monte Cristo." 



The Melodramatic James O'Neill. 167 

Dantes, this time amid surroundings so mas- 
sive and so gorgeous that one scarcely recog- 
nised him as the same old sixpence of " The 
world is mine ! " familiarity. 

Sidney Grundy's version of "The Three 
Musketeers " was arranged in ten tableaux. 
In most particulars it differed widely from 
other stage adaptations, and in many in- 
stances it also wandered far from the novel. 
The main departure from Dumas was made 
in the character of Constance, who, according 
to Mr. Grundy's way of thinking, was a more 
proper person as Bonacieux's daughter than 
as his wife. The prologue, which showed 
the branding of Anne de Breuil to the ac- 
companiment of much thunder and lightning, 
was also entirely new to the stage. The 
second tableau, depicting the arrival of D'Ar- 
tagnan at the inn outside Paris, was not un- 
like the old-time version, first played by 
Charles Fechter, I believe, and later by 
Alexander Salvini. The scene ended, how- 



168 Famous Actors. 

ever, with a fight between D'Artagnan and 
the Cardinal's soldiers, which was new. 
The third tableau combined the meeting of 
D'Artagnan with the three musketeers and 
his quarrels with them, the introduction to 
De Treville, the duel between D'Artagnan 
and Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, and the 
glorious fray with the Cardinal's men. This 
forceful combination was also a new idea. 

The fourth tableau flew directly in the face 
of Dumas's story. D'Artagnan was repre- 
sented as repeating — a most improbable 
circumstance — Athos' s melancholy life-story 
to Miladi, and then discovering, after he had 
worked this mischief, the fleur-de-lis branded 
on that precious female's arm. Naturally 
enough, the woman was furiously angry at 
the inadvertent revelation, and raged like a 
fury. Failing in her attempt to stab D'Ar- 
tagnan, she shouted with might and main for 
the Cardinal's guard. The valiant band came 
all right, but was promptly put out of working 



The Melodramatic James O'Neill. 169 

order by the valiant Gascon, who escaped 
from his uncomfortable predicament by jump- 
ing through a window, leaving Miladi to 
comfort her perturbed spirit by vigorously 
pummelling a defenceless and inoffensive 
couch. 

The fifth tableau introduced the Duke of 
Buckingham, who proceeded to loan his fine 
clothes to Bonacieux, which kind act led to 
the unfortunate provision merchant's arrest 
in the duke's stead. From this point Mr. 
Grundy strayed into the episode of the dia- 
mond necklace. He pictured the meeting 
between the queen and Buckingham, the 
plotting of the Cardinal and Miladi, the in- 
viting of the queen to the ball, at which she 
must wear the diamond necklace, — in Mr. 
Grundy's version, however, a cluster of dia- 
monds instead of a string, — the arrival of 
D'Artagnan in the nick of time with the 
jewels, and the downfall of the Cardinal 
and Miladi. How and where D'Artagnan 



170 Famous Actors. 

came into possession of the gems was not 
explained by Mr. Grundy. 

But the most astonishing happening of the 
whole play occurred at the end of the eighth 
tableau. The queen had received her invita- 
tion to the ball, and had been told that she 
must wear all her jewels. 

" Alas ! " she exclaims, " I am undone. 
Who will save me?" 

"I will," remarks a voice from nowhere 
in particular. The helmet pops off an here- 
tofore unnoticed coat of mail over in the 
corner, revealing the smiling countenance of 
the intrepid D'Artagnan. It was for all the 
world like the unexpected appearance of the 
omnipresent detective in the thrilling tales, 
with which we beguiled many a fleeting hour 
in happy boyhood days. 

The remembrance of this luridly impossible 
scene encourages me to breathe a suspicion 
that grew stronger and stronger as Mr. 
Grundy's play developed. I have an idea that 



The Melodramatic James O'Neill. 171 

this Grundy version was something in the line 
of a practical joke. I should not be surprised 
to learn that all the time Mr. Grundy was put- 
ting it together he was laughing in his sleeve. 
For Mr. Grundy, although he is an English- 
man, must have a slight sense of humour. I 
have an idea, too, that Mr. O'Neill, regard- 
ing whose sense of humour, since he is an 
Irishman, there can be no doubt at all, 
thoroughly appreciated Mr. Grundy's little 
joke. O'Neill acted D'Artagnan seriously 
enough, with valour prodigious, impetuosity 
irrepressible, gallantry incomparable, shrewd- 
ness astonishing ; but that Mr. O'Neill had a 
mighty good time in the midst of all the 
hifalutin, there could be no doubt. More 
than once I fancied that I could detect the 
telltale twinkle of the eye that betokened 
rare sport. 

The spectacular production of the Charles 
Fechter version of " Monte Cristo " was first 
shown to the public in Boston on September 



172 Famous Actors. 

18, 1900. There was no gainsaying the 
elaborateness, completeness, and general ef- 
fectiveness of this scenic glorification. The 
first one of the nine big sets represented 
the port of Marseilles, and the spectators 
were treated to the sight of a full-rigged 
ship coming into the harbour. This scene 
was also notable for the excellent handling 
of the crowds in the foreground. Another 
mechanical wonder was the Chateau dTf of 
the second act, a massive-looking structure, 
which split up into sections in the most be- 
wildering fashion when it came time to show 
the open sea and the escape of Dantes from 
prison. Before the revelations of the con- 
servatory and ballroom of the Hotel de Mor- 
cerf, pictured in the fourth act, all that had 
gone before faded into insignificance. Solid- 
ness and brilliancy characterised this mag- 
nificent setting. 

Regarding " Monte Cristo " asa play there 
is little that is worth writing at this late day. 



The Melodramatic James O'Neill. 173 

It is, of course, the most obvious melodrama, 
unnatural, forced, and poorly indicative of the 
absorbing power of Alexandre Dumas's ro- 
mance. Yet it has decided theatrical per- 
suasiveness and interest, and it shines with 
a light almost of inspiration in comparison 
with several of the hodge-podge dramatisa- 
tions of romances that were placed on the 
stage during the season of 1900-01. 

Mr. O'Neill's Dantes was always pictur- 
esque, consistent in conception, surprisingly 
natural in view of the strained sentiment 
that he was called upon to speak. The char- 
acterisation was not altogether wanting in 
superficial pathos, and the actor's skill in 
working up to and sustaining climaxes made 
the impersonation remarkably effective dra- 
matically. 

When this last production of " Monte 
Cristo " was made, the old Fechter version 
was revised to the extent of making Mercedes 
Edmond's wife and Albert a legitimate child. 



174 Famous Actors. 

This was accomplished by means of an inter- 
polated marriage scene, and its effect on the 
drama as a whole made one think of the 
remark about straining at a gnat and swal- 
lowing a camel. In the old version of the 
play Dantes was arrested before the cere- 
mony, wedding him to Mercedes, had been 
performed. Subsequently, Mercedes became 
the wife of Fernande, and Albert, Dantes's 
son, passed as the son of Mercedes and Fer- 
nande. After Mercedes had been married to 
Dantes in the new version, poor Fernande 
was in a most unpleasant situation. The 
exposition of the plot demanded that Dantes 
should believe Albert to be Fernande* s son. 
Yet it would not do to marry Mercedes to 
Fernande, after having previously married 
her to Dantes, for bigamy — even uncon- 
scious bigamy — would have been more 
shocking than illegitimacy. It was really 
a pretty problem what to do with Fernande, 
so pretty, indeed, that the revisers ignored 



The Melodramatic James O'Neill. 175 

it completely. They calmly required us to 
believe that Fernande and Mercedes lived 
blamelessly together for eighteen years, man 
and wife in the eyes of the world, even in 
the eyes of their own household. Such was 
the absurdity resulting from Puritanical shy- 
ing at Dumas's minor peccadillo. 



CHAPTER XII. 

JAMES A. HERNE's "SAG HARBOUR." 

" Sag Harbour " proved to be the last one 
of the series of dramas of which James A. 
Heme was the author, and the last play, too, 
in which he appeared as a player, for this 
prominent American actor and playwright 
died in his home in New York City on June 
2, 1 90 1, after an eight weeks' illness. Mr. 
Heme had been in poor health for a long 
time. Even as far back as the fall of 1899, 
when " Sag Harbour " was first acted, he 
was not himself physically. At that time 
he suffered severely from rheumatism, though 
he continued playing without interruption, 
except for the summer rest, until February, 
190 1. While touring the one-night stands 
176 



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'■''JPfe^ J 







JAMES A. HERXE 
As Capt. Dan Marble in " Sag Harbour." 



y. A. Hemes "Sag Harbour" 177 

of the West, he was compelled to discon- 
tinue acting. A short rest benefited him, 
and he resumed his work at the opening of 
the Chicago engagement in " Sag Harbour. " 
Again, however, he was obliged to give up, and 
this time he went to West Baden, Indiana, to 
recuperate. A week there apparently helped 
him greatly, and once more he attempted act- 
ing. It was no use, however, and Mr. Heme 
said good-bye to the stage for ever. 

Mr. Heme's theatrical career was a notable 
one of forty-two years' duration. He received 
his training under the severe discipline of the 
old stock company days, and was successively 
leading man and star, manager and dramatist. 
In addition, he was a thoroughly capable 
and an unusually artistic stage-manager. Mr. 
Heme's first play was " Hearts of Oak," a 
melodrama, produced in Chicago in 1878, and 
so lasting a popular success that it is still 
touring the country. Next came " The Minute 
Man," produced in Philadelphia in 1885, and 



178 Famous Actors. 

" Drifting Apart," brought out in New York a 
little later, neither of them successful. " Mar- 
garet Fleming," acted in Boston in 1888, was 
the pioneer "problem play," an original and 
daring drama, which, however, never appealed 
to the public. Mr. Heme's biggest success 
was " Shore Acres," first played in Chicago 
in 1892. His most ambitious and worthiest 
drama was "Griffith Davenport," given for 
the first time in Washington, D. C, in Janu- 
ary, 1899. The merits of this play, however, 
were not of the popular sort, and consequently 
the work was seen in only a few cities. " Sag 
Harbour " was first brought out in Boston on 
October 24, 1899. It proved to be typ- 
ically Hernesque in workmanship, full of 
homely human nature, and amusing, charac- 
teristic local colour. These vital merits more 
than atoned for its lack of artistic finish in 
certain particulars of construction. 

In calling Mr. Heme the representative 
dramatist of American country life, one is 



J. A. Heme's "Sag Harbour. 11 179 

only stating a recognised truth, and if one 
should put the case stronger yet, and desig- 
nate him the representative American dram- 
atist of his generation, one would probably 
be only foreshadowing a judgment that will 
be more authoritatively passed later. James 
A. Heme deserved his success and reputa- 
tion. He was honest and he was faithful. 
He was a man with an ideal. He worked 
hard for such recognition as he won. He 
faced disaster bravely, and he refused to be 
discouraged. He never quit. To quote Is- 
rael Zangwill, "Nothing will alter my admi- 
ration for a man who has for years fought 
almost single-handed in the cause of artistic 
sincerity." 

" Sag Harbour " was mainly notable for the 
rich quality of its humour. In this respect 
Mr. Heme fairly surpassed himself. It was 
homely, of course, the humour of honest and 
simple-minded men and women, who had not 
been refined into seeing suggestiveness and 



180 Famous Actors, 

indelicacy in blunt, old-fashioned frankness. 
Widow Russell's reminiscences of her husband 
were drolly true to life, and the juiciness of 
some of Capt. Dan Marble's observations was 
beyond compare. A playwright not so close 
to life as Mr. Heme would have made a wreck 
of such broadness, — he would have been vul- 
gar and coarse where Mr. Heme was simply 
bluff and hearty. For instance, Captain 
Marble, who has long been courting Elizabeth 
Ann Turner, — so long that even he almost de- 
spairs of ever winning her, — declares that it is 
his firm belief that the only thing which keeps 
Elizabeth Ann from marrying him is the 
Book of Genesis, and the particular chapter 
in the Book of Genesis that contains all the 
"begets. ,, The captain, with the best in- 
tentions in the world, becomes mixed up in 
a love-affair that forms the plot of the play. 
He is on the wrong tack, however, and in- 
stead of unravelling the tangle makes it worse 
than ever. " You've raised hell here," is his 



J. A. Hemes "Sag Harbour." 181 

sole comment when he learns his mistake, but 
no phrase could have been more to the point. 

The plot of " Sag Harbour " was ordinary. 
It involved the fortunes of two brothers, both 
of whom loved the same woman. Mr. Heme 
called it " an old story," and so it was ; but 
it was, nevertheless, a story that had an abid- 
ing sentimental interest, and one that made 
its sure appeal to every woman and, to a less 
degree, to every man. Moreover, a familiar 
theme lends itself readily to the quiet, life- 
like treatment that was Mr. Heme's unique 
characteristic. He put humanity into his 
plays, and one always finds the old stories, 
when adorned with sincerity and truth, the 
most touching. 

Mr. Heme placed his action in Sag Har- 
bour, a village on Long Island, which in the 
old days was a prosperous whaling port. 
With remarkable fidelity to nature, he trans- 
ferred to the theatre the quaint atmosphere 
of a typical New England seaport, not by 



1 82 Famous Actors. 

means of an elaborately bedecked stage, for 
the scenery in " Sag Harbour " was decidedly 
a minor consideration, but by means of the 
spirit of straightforward honesty that shone 
through the characterisations. There were 
melodramatic touches, to be sure, but, except 
for these occasional lapses, mere theatrical 
artifice was never apparent. 

The plot may be briefly outlined thus : 
Martha Reese, an orphan, is adopted when 
a child by Ben Turner, and she grows into 
womanhood in his home. He loves her, but 
fearing that she thinks him too old to be her 
husband, he dares not tell her of his love. 
In the meantime, she becomes betrothed to 
Frank Turner, Ben's younger brother, but 
Ben does not know of this ; and when he is 
misled into thinking that Martha cares for 
him, he rushes through his proposal with- 
out giving her a chance to explain how 
matters stand. Martha, believing that Ben 
needs her more than Frank, marries him, 



J. A. Heme's "Sag Harbour." 183 

and for two years Ben does not learn the 
truth. By this time a child has been born, 
and Martha has come really to love her 
husband. But after Ben has heard of her 
former engagement to Frank, he finds it 
hard to believe, when Martha declares that 
she loves him, that she is speaking the truth, 
and, in his distress, he quarrels violently with 
her and with his brother. Of course, the 
final curtain falls on a complete reconciliation. 
Frank sees the hope of happiness in Jane 
Cauldwell, who long has loved him, and Capt. 
Dan Marble, whose blundering attempt to 
make every one happy was the first cause of 
the difficulty, and whose tact finally brought 
together husband and wife, is also rewarded 
in a way most satisfactory to him. 

The main dramatic strength of " Sag Har- 
bour " was in the last two acts. Ben has his 
eyes opened to the true state of affairs by 
overhearing a conversation between Martha 
and Frank. This leads to a scene power- 



184 Famous Actors, 

fully impressive. The two brothers almost 
come to blows, when Martha interferes and 
is roughly thrown aside by her husband, 
whose anger has well-nigh overwhelmed him. 
The ending of the play, except in one partic- 
ular, was logical and thoroughly satisfactory. 
That one particular was the parcelling off of 
Frank. The idea may have been right 
enough, but the element of time made Frank's 
change from Martha to Jane, although she, 
to be sure, did all the wooing, altogether too 
sudden. The conclusion of the second act, 
it should be noted, was an especially fine bit 
of comedy. All unconscious of the tragic 
side of his betrothal, Ben called for cham- 
pagne as the only fitting beverage in which 
to pledge his happiness, and it was with the 
assistance of the genial influence of this un- 
accustomed drink that Captain Marble won 
his Elizabeth. 

Captain Marble, as presented by Mr. 
Heme, was one of those lovable characters 



J, A. Hemes " Sag Harbour" 185 

of which his Uncle Nat, in " Shore Acres,'' 
was so delightful a type. It was a perfect 
representation of gentleness and kindliness, 
a man, too, bubbling over with humour, and 
with a heart that inspired kindly sympathy. 
No one but Mr. Heme could so fully have 
expressed the moment when Captain Marble 
learned that he was to have the great desire 
of his life, a child of his own. Not a word 
was spoken, but one saw the wonder and the 
happiness of it all gradually dawn on him, 
and one believed him when he said, " You 
could have knocked me over with a feather." 
A prosaic analysis of a Heme play is im- 
possible. In developing a plot Mr. Heme 
was a law unto himself, and his subtil ty 
defied the probing pen of the critic. He 
placed character above all else. This may 
seem a surprising statement to those who 
were accustomed to much talking about Mr. 
Heme's realism and who failed to see that 
this realism, after all, was only an appropriate 



1 86 Famous Actors. 

frame for character. Atmosphere, which Mr. 
Heme obtained with such surety, was neces- 
sary because it instantly put one in touch 
with the personages of his plays, and so be- 
came an important adjunct to the leading 
essential, the exposition of character. Neither 
were Mr. Heme's characters merely types. 
Of course, each one might be to a certain 
degree considered as one of a class, but 
one finds that quality everywhere apparent in 
real life. Belonging to a class, however, does 
not destroy individuality. Captain Marble, 
for example, was in no respect the same man 
as Nathaniel Berry, though one did unques- 
tionably suggest the other. 




MACLYN ARBUCKLE. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

MACLYN ARBUCKLE. 

Maclyn Arbuckle was widely introduced 
to the playgoing public through the medium- 
ship of a three-act farce by George H. Broad- 
hurst, called "Why Smith Left Home." 
This work was originally produced in Adrian, 
Michigan, on August 17, 1898, and later 
it had the distinction of a successful run in 
London, a rare achievement for an American 
play. "Why Smith Left Home " was good, 
honest fun, and it deserved its vogue. It 
pointed the way along which the artistic 
farce should travel. Indeed, if Mr. Broad- 
hurst had not been so prone to pursue con- 
ventionality, if he had not burdened his 
originality with the familiar boresome love- 
187 



1 88 Famous Actors. 

affairs of a boresome old maid, with the tire- 
some tyranny of a mother-in-lawish aunt, and 
with the customary antics of a sporty though 
henpecked husband, one would be justified 
in declaring that "Why Smith Left Home" 
was itself travelling on the artistic highway 
previously mentioned. A drama is real when 
its plot is developed, not to exploit the 
mechanics of theatrical effect, but to further 
the exposition of character; and so general 
is this principle that it is exactly as appli- 
cable to farce as it is to tragedy. For in- 
stance, the human nature of the several 
interesting and original character studies in 
Mr. Broadhurst's play was none the less 
genuine because it was shown in a facetious 
instead of in a serious light. In farce, how- 
ever, where exaggeration and burlesque are 
proper, character can be but superficially indi- 
cated by the dramatic action, and the actor 
can justly claim the credit for any subtle evi- 
dences of reality that may be noticeable in 



Maclyn Arbuckle. 189 

the part that he assumes. His is the task 
of drawing the fine line between farcing and 
buffoonery. 

By his acting of John Smith in this 
Broadhurst farce, Mr. Arbuckle immediately 
showed himself a light comedian of excep- 
tional personality, of distinguished finesse, 
and of unusual comic power. It was master- 
ful farcing throughout, deft, easy, sure, sug- 
gestive, and with a background of sincerity 
and solid characterisation that gave the per- 
sonation reality and convincing power. Mr. 
Arbuckle was keen in his search for the 
ridiculous and constantly successful in find- 
ing it. Yet he was always self-contained, 
rarely boisterous, and under every circum- 
stance faithful to his character. As an 
example of delicious and effective travesty 
I know of nothing better than his speech 
of rebuke in the last act to the meddlesome 
Aunt Mary. It was Mark Antony's funeral 
oration turned bottom side up. 



I go Famous Actors. 

" Why Smith Left Home " burlesqued 
that problem in domestic economy known 
as the servant girl question, and its satire 
was thoroughly United States. It could not 
be claimed that Mr. Broadhurst equalled in 
ingenuity and neatness of construction sev- 
eral farces of foreign workmanship that have 
been done in English. There was occasion- 
ally crudity and roughness in his action, 
which would never have been felt in the 
best of farcical writing. He loaded himself 
down with too much antiquated material, 
which was centred in a secondary plot deal- 
ing with the relations between a sentimental 
old maid and a blundering German count. 
All this was artistic dead wood, though fortu- 
nately its dullness was counterbalanced by 
the lively interest found in the main action. 
The idea of mixing up the servant girl ques- 
tion with the labour union problem was an 
inspiration ; the idea of having the man of 
the house bribe the cook to cook as badly 



Maclyn Arbuckle. 191 

as she knew how, so as to drive away unwel- 
come visitors, was another inspiration ; and, 
in these days of farces dancing in mad circles 
around marital infelicity, it may be added 
that the idea of making a man really in 
love with his wife, and impervious to the 
blandishments of pretty housemaids and 
pretty masqueraders in short red gowns 
that revealed tantalising ankles, was a third 
inspiration. 

Yet Mr. Broadhurst's three inspirations, 
potent as they were, would hardly have 
excited quite so much hilarity without the 
aid of the efficient company to which he 
entrusted his play ; nor would his dialogue 
have seemed so snappy and appropriate, his 
occasional quaint twists of phrases so mirth- 
ful, and his bits of slang so pat, if they had 
not been spoken by actors alive to every 
possibility of humour and attentive to the 
emphasising of points. Besides Mr. Ar- 
buckle, there was Mrs. Annie Yeamans 



192 Famous Actors. 

in that brilliant low comedy creation, La- 
vinia Daly, the "cook lady." Both of these 
actors, while playing in ideal farcical style, 
with full broad strokes and just the right 
amount of exaggeration, nevertheless gave 
two reproductions of living humanity. Mrs. 
Yeaman's " cook lady " was familiarly Hiber- 
nian. One would hesitate to call it a bur- 
lesque, although it was very, very funny. 
In essentials it brought faithfully to mind 
the habitual intelligence-office article. 

Maclyn Arbuckle was formerly a lawyer 
in Texarkana, Texas, where he was admitted 
to the bar in March, 1887. He was then 
not twenty-one years old, and the disability 
of minority had to be removed by the court 
before he could be accepted for examination. 
Judge John M. McLean was on the bench 
at the time, and Judge Shepard, afterward 
a member of Congress, was the prosecuting 
attorney of Bowie County, in which Texar- 
kana is situated. Mr. Arbuckle's examina- 



Maclyn Arbuckle. 193 

tion being the first of a would-be lawyer in 
open court in eight years, — other applicants 
having preferred the star-chamber process, — 
the event attracted considerable attention. 
Although quizzed by three of the shrewdest 
lawyers of the Bowie County bar, the young- 
ster came through with flying colours and 
was admitted to practise. 

Within a week he and another novice were 
assigned by the court to defend a negro 
charged with murder, and they succeeded 
in getting him acquitted, without putting 
a witness for the defence on the stand, by 
tearing the State's case to pieces on cross 
examination. Although this trial gave 
Arbuckle a reputation, it threw criminal 
practice in his way almost entirely. There 
was little money in this, and he was finally 
forced to give up his office and share a room 
with a book agent who was selling an edition 
of Shakespeare. Mr. Arbuckle spent much 
of his time, and he had plenty of it, com- 



194 Famous Actors. 

mitting to memory Shakespearian verse, 
afterward spouting it for the entertainment 
of his friends from a pool-table in a Texar- 
kana billiard hall. Finally he ran for justice 
of the peace, and was defeated by a grocer. 
This disgusted Arbuckle with politics, besides 
injuring what law practice he had. 

Consequently, when Peter Baker, the Ger- 
man comedian, heard of Arbuckle's fame as 
a Shakespearian reader and offered him a 
position in his company, the discontented 
lawyer jumped at the chance. He made 
his first appearance at the Christmas mati- 
nee, 1888, in Shreveport, Louisiana, playing 
a German dialect part, and his debut was 
accounted a failure. Baker, in fact, advised 
him to hurry back to Texarkana and resume 
law, but Arbuckle would not do that. He 
secured an engagement with R. D. McLean 
and Marie Prescott in very heavy "legiti- 
mate," continuing with them for three 
years. He was brought to a painful realisa- 



Mactyn Arbitckle. 195 

tion of the fact that a little pudgy nose and 
a double chin did not fit him for Roman char- 
acters by the curt remark of a New York critic 
in reference to a performance of " Sparta- 
cus." This writer declared that Mr. Arbuckle 
" looked more like an East Side butcher 
than a Roman/' This authoritative opinion 
drove Mr. Arbuckle into comedy, and he 
subsequently appeared in several of Charles 
Frohman's productions and in "The Man 
from Mexico. He was also with T. Daniel 
Frawley's stock company in San Francisco, 
where he acted the title part in " The 
Senator," Zouroff in " Moths," and Jack 
Dudley in "The Ensign." During the 
season of 1900-01, Mr. Arbuckle tried 
starring, but his play, " The Sprightly Ro- 
mance of Marsac," dramatised by William 
Young from Mollie Elliott Seawell's story, 
and produced in Washington on November 
5, 1900, was a failure. Later he was seen 
as the Earl of Rockingham in " Under Two 



196 Famous Actors. 

Flags," the spectacular melodrama which 
Paul M. Potter made from Ouida's novel. 

In the N. C. Goodwin production of " The 
Merchant of Venice," which toured the coun- 
try for twenty-eight performances during the 
spring of 1901, Mr. Arbuckle played Antonio. 
This Shakespearian character, notwithstand- 
ing its prominence in the drama, is rather 
an unsatisfactory proposition from the actor's 
standpoint. Antonio lacks positiveness. 
He is the pivot around which the action of 
the play revolves, and the point, too, on 
which the action is finally focussed. But 
Antonio himself is passive. He is the 
model of a temperate man, neither lavishly 
generous like Bassanio nor miserly stingy 
like Shylock. He has, however, the unfor- 
tunate quality of indifference, and he is 
afflicted with a strange melancholy, which 
robs him of any decided interest in life or 
even in his own ventures. It is this fault 
of indifference which indirectly brings him 



Maclyn Arbuckle. 197 

within the Jew's power. Antonio's negative 
greatness is technically necessary, for were 
he more active and more vitally human, one's 
sympathy with him in his suffering would 
be altogether too painful and exciting. 

Mr. Arbuckle's impersonation of Antonio 
was a sturdy and honest effort, straightfor- 
ward and genuine, but not especially power- 
ful. His reading of the lines was plain and 
clear, and generally effective, and in his 
delivery of the speech emphasising his love 
for Bassanio he was sincere and moving. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

JOHN HARE. 

Some captious friend is sure to inform me 
that I have absolutely no excuse for the 
liberty that I have boldly granted myself of 
forcing into a volume, which professes to 
deal with the lives and deeds of American 
actors, an article on John Hare, the promi- 
nent and greatly admired English comedian. 
As a matter of fact, I know, exactly as well 
as my captious friend knows, that, in making 
the elastic phrase, " in America/' include Mr. 
Hare, I am stretching it to an unwarranted 
and even dangerous tension. Still, there are 
extenuating circumstances, because of which 
I am eagerly running the risk of getting my 
fingers stung, should the straining thread, 
198 




JOHN HARE. 



John Hare. 199 

with which I have encircled Mr. Hare, sud- 
denly snap. In the first place, these sketches 
of players form a fairly complete record of 
the contemporaneous stage in this country ; 
and during the season of 1900-01 Mr. 
Hare was a prominent figure on the Ameri- 
can stage. Furthermore, he was professedly 
here for the last time, on his farewell visit. 
Consequently, if I do not seize this occasion 
to thrust him into a book, I may never have 
another chance. Moreover, I wanted very 
much to talk over Arthur Wing Pinero's 
peculiar play, "The Gay Lord Quex," and 
I could not do that without inviting Mr. 
Hare to share in the conversation. Lastly, 
I am sure that theatregoers in the United 
States have love enough and admiration 
enough for John Hare, and curiosity enough 
regarding him, to read, at least with passing 
interest, a brief chronicle of his professional 
achievements. 

"The Gay Lord Quex" was first acted at 



200 Famous Actors. 

the Globe Theatre, London, on April 8, 1 899, 
and scored an immediate success. Mr. Hare 
brought the play to this country and acted it 
for the first time on this side of the water 
in New York, on November 12, 1900. Its 
reception here was scarcely less enthusiastic 
than in England. Immediately after the 
London production came the discussion that 
follows inevitably in the wake of a Pinero 
play, and an anxious world was informed that 
" The Gay Lord Quex " was everything under 
the sun, from a masterpiece of dramatic art 
to an inconceivably vile specimen of cynical 
depravity. On one point, however, pros and 
cons were agreed : they both found the 
comedy intensely interesting. 

This, then, is the plot of "The Gay Lord 
Quex." A manicure girl, Sophy Fullgarney, 
who conducts a large business in offices of 
her own, — a vulgar, sentimental, but en- 
tirely honest woman, — is deeply concerned 
in the fortunes of her foster-sister, a young 



John Hare. 201 

lady of high social position. The manicure 
girl is shocked because an engagement has 
been made between her foster-sister and the 
gay Lord Quex, a middle-aged nobleman with 
a scandalous past. The manicure girl also 
helps on a serious flirtation between the 
foster-sister and an impecunious army officer 
of her own age ; and presently, being at the 
country house with the nobleman, and quite 
discrediting his professions of reformation, 
Sophy plays decoy to coax him into improper 
attentions to herself, in order to open the 
eyes of her foster-sister. Failing in this 
scheme, because Lord Quex meets her more 
pronounced advances with cool contempt, she 
spies upon the nobleman and one of his 
former lady-loves, the Duchess of Strood, 
and finally catches them together in the ex- 
lady-love's room at a midnight interview, to 
which Lord Quex has consented only for 
the purpose of ending the liaison. 

To get to this scene — which, in short, is 



202 Famous Actors. 

the backbone of the great third act and of 
the play as well — there is, it must be con- 
fessed, the faintest suspicion that Mr. Pinero 
has stretched a point. However, nothing 
hopelessly impossible was introduced, and 
for what he did present, the playwright 
had the excuse of an undeniably exciting 
situation. When Sophy is discovered at 
the keyhole, the duchess is packed off to a 
friend's room with the assurance that her 
reputation, at least, shall be saved. Then 
Lord Quex, after seeing that all the doors 
are securely locked, sits down to discuss 
terms with Sophy. Persuasion will not do ; 
bribery will not do ; threats will not do, and 
Lord Quex then proceeds to measures that 
are scarcely gentlemanly. He explains to 
Sophy the exact position which the affair 
will assume when she rings the bell. He 
reminds her that Valma, the palmist, to 
whom she is engaged to be married, is sleep- 
ing under the same roof. In short, he puts 



John Hare. 203 

the case to her from every point of view 
that the most unscrupulous blackguardism 
could suggest to him. It looks, indeed, as if 
Lord Quex will never recover our respect, 
when he succeeds finally in inducing the 
miserable woman to write, at his dictation, 
a letter compromising herself. Lord Quex 
takes the letter to use it in his own way ; 
but then comes Sophy's revulsion of 
feeling. 

"Why, it's like selling Muriel/' she says. 
"Just to get myself out of this, I'm simply 
handing her over to you. I won't do it ! I 
won't ! She sha'n't marry you ; she sha'n't ! 
I've said she sha'n't, and she sha'n't ! " 

Upon that she rings the bell. And what 
does the Lord Quex say to that ? He is 
struck at once by the courage of the girl, — 
her devotion to Muriel. 

" By God ! you're a fine-plucked 'un," he 
exclaims. " I've never known a better. No, 
my girl, I'm damned if you shall suffer! 



204 Famous Actors. 

Here's your letter. Take it. I won't have 
it." 

The house has been disturbed by the sound 
of the bell. What is to be done next ? Quex 
is equal to any emergency. He gets Sophy 
away unseen, his last words being, " Serve 
me how you please. Miss Fullgarney, upon 
my soul, I humbly beg your pardon." 

In the last act Sophy appears once more in 
her manicure parlours, having decided not to 
betray Lord Quex, who has acted so hand- 
somely. All that remains is to sicken the 
foster-sister of the young officer with whom 
the manicure girl had been advising her to 
make a runaway marriage. This is easily 
accomplished. Lord Quex knows that the 
young man is made of cheap masculine 
mettle. " Just tempt him as you tempted 
me," he says ; " the captain is what I was 
at his age, only worse." So once more the 
manicure girl plays decoy. The officer 
promptly takes the bait and is caught with 



John Hare. 205 

the girl in his arms by the indignant foster- 
sister. Of course, this young lady does not 
run away with the youth, yields gracefully to 
the family wishes, and marries the elderly 
nobleman. 

" The Gay Lord Quex " was absolutely 
great as an example of dramatic construction, 
but as a work of art — using the word art in 
its highest sense, as characterising an idealis- 
tic creation by means of which one man in- 
spires in another emotions and sentiments — 
as a work of art, " The Gay Lord Quex " had 
no standing at all. It was no more art than 
is the magnificent and highly complicated 
machinery, which drives the ocean greyhound 
from Liverpool to New York in a few hours 
over five days. 

" The Gay Lord Quex " did not inspire a 
single emotion. One watched the passing of 
its action in cold blood. There was not a 
personage in the play in whom one had even 
a trace of vital interest. Yet " The Gay Lord 



206 Famous Actors. 

Quex" certainly made an appeal, for it was 
constantly interesting, and in the third act it 
was wholly absorbing. Its appeal was to the 
intellect. It was so masterly done that one 
could not help admiring it and being carried 
along by it, even though he realised all the 
time that he was being gulled by the most 
patent of artifices. 

The play was written around a single situa- 
tion, out of which was squeezed every atom 
of dramatic force and every possible shade of 
comedy. This single situation was led up 
to by two acts that were largely irrelevant, 
but which, nevertheless, were so novel, so 
picturesque, so wonderfully ingenious, that in- 
terest in them never failed ; and, again, this 
single incident was closed by means of an 
act that, under ordinary conditions, would 
have been absolutely worthless, but which 
under Mr. Pinero's deft manipulation held 
the attention to the final curtain. 

The result, taken as a whole, was nothing 



John Hare. 207 

short of astounding when one considered the 
comparatively insignificant material with which 
the playwright laboured. In " The Gay Lord 
Quex" one experienced a comedy with the 
unmistakable stamp of cleverness, a comedy of 
farcical tinge in many of its phases, a comedy 
full of wit that answered its stage purpose 
perfectly, a comedy showing forth characters, 
one of them, Sophy Fullgarney, a strikingly 
original and forceful conception, and all of 
them individual and entertaining ; and finally 
a comedy all the accumulated power of which 
reached its full force in an act of the most 
biting incisiveness, of the most intense dra- 
matic interest, in an act achieving the acme 
of emotional contrast, of splendidly utilised 
suspense, and of effective climactic construc- 
tion. 

Analyse the great third act, if you wish to 
have revealed the most perfect of trickery in 
playing upon an audience's susceptibilities. 
Notice how softly it begins with the Duchess 



208 Famous Actors. 

of Strood and Mrs. Jack Eden ; how cau- 
tiously the little points are made ; how inno- 
cently the details of architecture, — the lay 
of the land, as it were, — the halls and the 
doors, and especially the situation of Sophy's 
room, are explained. One gets them all, and 
then, if he stop to think, wonders how it 
happens that he knows so much. Notice 
how emphatically the motive for Quex's at- 
titude toward Sophy is insisted upon, — one 
is not merely led to suspect that she is listen- 
ing at the door, nor is he left to the satis- 
faction of hearing from her own lips that she 
has been listening ; one has it strikingly and 
dramatically demonstrated before his eyes 
that she is listening. 

Notice the constant backing and filling, 
the hemming and hawing, the pulling first 
this way and then that, in the long scene 
between Quex and Sophy ; the various steps 
by which Quex strengthens his position, 
until he has the woman at his mercy, con- 



John Hare. 209 

quered, reduced to an hysterical pulp ; then 
the master-stroke by means of which in a 
second the entire situation changes, and it is 
the woman who is triumphant ; finally the in- 
genious, natural, but unforeseen device which 
closes the incident. Notice all these things, 
and then reflect by how much either action 
or characters have been developed through 
this breathless episode. Just to this extent, 
that Sophy has been made to believe that 
Quex may possibly be a good enough husband 
for her precious Muriel. 

It was impossible not to be impressed and 
thrilled by this third act, and all this, not 
because it was a situation naturally strongly 
dramatic, but because it was a situation made 
strongly dramatic by the most skilful treat- 
ment. The fundamental weakness of this 
act — and of the whole play, for that mat- 
ter — was in the strange circumstance that 
there was not a single character with which 
one could fully and frankly sympathise. The 



2io Famous Actors. 

consequence was that while the brilliancy and 
the entertaining elements of Pinero's play 
were amply apparent, the whole affair was 
wanting in conviction. It never drew blood. 
The interest inspired by both Quex and 
Sophy was supremely artificial. Indeed, 
left entirely to himself, Quex was impossible, 
after Mr. Pinero had made so exceedingly 
plain the colourfulness of his early days. 
But, for the safety of his play, the dramatist 
could not leave Quex impossible, and con- 
sequently one found Mr. Pinero constantly 
smoothing out with comforting fingers the 
wrinkles in Quex's reputation, and finally 
covering them over entirely with the ready 
mantle of reform. 

It seemed to me that Mr. Pinero was afraid 
of Quex after he had brought him into being, 
and endowed him with an evil reputation. 
He was afraid lest we should be too thor- 
oughly convinced that Quex actually deserved 
his reputation, and therefore Mr. Pinero kept 



John Hare. 211 

concealing Quex's sins with a mantle of 
charity, which no one was supposed to see, 
but which was there just the same. Quex's 
crimes of the past were made vexingly in- 
definite, — even his liaison with the Duchess 
of Strood, which had to be insisted upon 
with some force, never got beyond the stage 
of mysterious hinting. Quex's reformation 
was violently dwelt upon, and, greatest touch 
of all, he was ever shown in striking contrast 
with the unquestionably depraved Sir Chi- 
chester. 

The consequence was that, unless one in- 
sisted continually to himself that Quex was a 
very wicked fellow, he found himself regard- 
ing the little lord as a pretty fair specimen of 
the average man after all, an opinion which 
was exactly what Mr. Pinero meant that one 
should hold. One saw that Quex was sincere 
in his love, that he was square, sportsman- 
like, chivalrous at the moment of supreme 
test, and finally that he was almost self-sacri- 



212 Famous Actors. 

ficingly generous. Oh, it was all ingenious, 
marvellously ingenious, — first on the part of 
Mr. Pinero, who arranged it all, and secondly 
on the part of Mr. Hare, who presented Quex 
without a flaw in the rakish conception, but 
still with a suggestive, but not insistent, air 
of innocence. 

In the case of Sophy the difficulty was ex- 
actly opposite to that encountered with Quex. 
Sophy had to be pulled out of the sympa- 
thetic calcium instead of being pushed into 
it. Indeed, as it was, she exhibited a most 
trying persistency in grabbing situations, a 
persistency which, I can well believe, kept 
Mr. Pinero wide awake many nights in a 
vain endeavour to avoid. Sophy was vulgar, 
it is true, but her heart was in the right 
place, and this was open sesame to the 
tender susceptibilities of the theatre. She 
did several dishonourable things, but she did 
them with a good purpose. She ought to 
have been a continuous gleaner of senti- 



John Hare, 213 

mental approval, but, somehow or other, she 
was not. I confess, I do not know just how 
it happened, but Mr. Pinero did get one to 
looking at her as actually perverse and small- 
minded in holding Quex so tightly in the 
trap into which he had gotten himself. 

Altogether, the whole affair was intensely 
artificial, supremely effective, and marvel- 
lously entertaining, and the manner of the 
man, who found in "The Gay Lord Quex " 
a drama of purpose, I cannot understand. 
It was not written to expound anything at all 
except a certain novel and, in Pinero's hands, 
strong situation. The question, whether it is 
ever right to marry a comparatively innocent 
girl to a man with a past, was not even inci- 
dental. In fact, everything about the play, 
except the wonderful construction that made 
possible the third act and at the same time 
kept one continuously interested in three 
acts most trivial and inconsequential, was 
merely incidental. 



214 Famous Actors. 

The character drawing, like the construc- 
tion, was practically flawless, yet there was 
not a single personage on the stage that won 
sympathy or excited permanent interest. The 
heart of the spectator was never touched. 
The play was full of wit, but it was wholly 
without humour, and consequently without 
pathos. The total absence of conviction 
seemed to me to dispose of any question re- 
garding the influence of the play's undeniable 
cynicism on the impressionable and weak- 
minded. I doubt the effect either for good 
or for bad of a product so essentially super- 
ficial and artificial. 

One cannot analyse the art of John Hare 
— it is absurd to try to do so. His Quex 
was a complete personality, individual, per- 
fect, human. He lived throughout the play 
in perfect harmony with himself and with his 
surroundings. 

Scarcely less successful as an instance of 
perfect art, and even more striking, because 



John Hare. 215 

more theatrical, was Irene Vanbrugh's Sophy. 
After watching her impersonation through to 
the very end, one breathed a prayer of thanks 
to the actress for not once overdoing a good 
thing. Imagine a Sophy Fullgarney ever so 
little off the key, ever so little too highly 
coloured, ever so little crudely vulgarised ! 
A sorry plight, indeed, and still it would 
have been so easy to do. Miss Vanbrugh's 
greatest achievement was in never permit- 
ting one to forget that Sophy had a speak- 
ing acquaintance with refinement and good 
taste. 

Wholly from a sentimental reason, one 
almost felt sorry that Miss Vanbrugh, who 
fairly shared the honours with Mr. Hare, 
gave such a realistically perfect portrayal of 
Sophy Fullgarney. These wonderfully vivid 
and complete impersonations — and Miss 
Vanbrugh's Sophy was all that — have their 
drawbacks. In the first place, they are 
never fully appreciated. Art so fine that it 



2i6 Famous Actors. 

cannot be detected is art to a certain extent 
thrown away, for there is no doubt that the 
average spectator regards as most marvellous 
the acting that he can see rather than feel. 
On this fact is based a considerable pro- 
portion of the reputation of players with 
methods akin to those that have made Mrs. 
Leslie Carter famous. 

Work so fine, so subtle, so close to nature, 
and so impervious to analysis as that dis- 
played both by Miss Vanbrugh and Mr. 
Hare, is bound to pass unrecognised over 
the heads of some of us, who forget that it 
is effect, not an exposition of method, which 
should be sought for on the stage. Such 
acting is, indeed, self-sacrificing adherence 
to the maxim of Shakespeare, who declared 
— by inference — that the quiet appreciation 
of a single discerning spectator was worth 
more than the rude applause, inartistically 
gained, of a whole theatre of yokels. 

By her perfect realisation of Sophy Full- 



John Hare. 217 

garney, Miss Vanbrugh's personal reputation 
suffered from the fact that she could not, 
by any mental process which I have discov- 
ered, for a single instant be separated from 
the character that she impersonated. She 
was Sophy Fullgarney, and, to tell the truth, 
I was sorry for it, for, while Miss Sophy was 
in some respects a worthy enough young 
woman, in spite of Mr. Pinero's efforts to 
cut her out of sympathetic approval, she did 
not impress one as a wholly desirable acquaint- 
ance. Putting aside her inherent vulgarity, 
which might readily have been forgiven, 
there was an air of untrustworthiness, of 
feminine meanness, and of lack of the least 
notion of personal honour about her, which 
made her socially impossible even in a thor- 
oughly democratic community. 

Now, I could not bring myself to believe 
that Miss Vanbrugh herself was that way at 
all, but I must confess, with only Sophy 
Fullgarney to judge by, I could not conceive 



218 Famous Actors. 

how Miss Vanbrugh could be otherwise. 
All of which is submitted as highly com- 
mendatory to Miss Vanbrugh's art. 

With Mr. Hare the matter was on an 
entirely different basis. We knew positively 
that he was only playing Quex, the little 
man with the punctured reputation, for we 
had seen Mr. Hare as the best and most 
affable of gentlemen in "A Pair of Spec- 
tacles.' ' Moreover, Quex, realistically por- 
trayed as he was, did not once impress one 
as real with the same insistence that Sophy 
Fullgarney did. 

John Hare, whose real name is John Fairs, 
is London's oldest actor-manager, his career 
in that capacity having begun at the Court 
Square Theatre, Chelsea, on March 13, 1875. 
He thus antedates Henry Irving by several 
years. But long before 1875 Mr. Hare had 
established himself as a London favourite, 
for ten years before that he made his first 
professional appearance in the metropolis. 



John Hare. 219 

He had been a pupil of Leigh Murray, 
one of England's greatest light comedians, 
through whose influence Mr. Hare obtained 
the part of Short in " Naval Engagements " 
at the old Prince of Wales's Theatre in Tot- 
tenham Court Road, on the stage of which he 
was later to make such splendid successes in 
the long series of Robertson plays. Prior 
to this Mr. Hare had been in the stock com- 
pany of another Prince of Wales's Theatre, 
at Liverpool. Mr. J. L. Toole was starring 
there in a forgotten piece called " A Man of 
Business.'' Mr. Hare's first part was that 
of a fop. His next, still with Mr. Toole, 
was that of Lexicon in John Hollingshead's 
farce, "The Birthplace of Podgers." Then 
Mr. Hare, having won E. A. Sothern's ap- 
proval of his performance of the stuttering 
Jones in " David Garrick,' , was offered by 
him a part in " The Woman in Mauve," and 
though Alexander Henderson, on account of 
Hare's inexperience, was opposed to the 



220 Famous Actors. 

young actor playing the part, Sothern car- 
ried the day, and Mr. Hare scored so heavily 
that he had hopes of that goal of ambition, 
London. And this followed in due course, 
after previous appearances with Mr. — now 
Sir Squire — Bancroft, all in the year 1864. 
On November n, 1865, Mr. Hare went to 
London on the salary of two pounds a week, 
laying the foundation of that great reputation 
for playing old men when he acted the part of 
Lord Ptarmigant, in T. W. Robertson's " So- 
ciety/ ' Thenceforward he appeared in all the 
Prince of Wales's Theatre productions, first 
under Mrs. Bancroft (then Marie Wilton) and 
H. J. Byron, and then Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft. 
Mr. Hare only played in burlesque once, — 
Zerlina, in Byron's " Little Don Giovanni." 
He created Mr. Fluker, in Byron's " A Hun- 
dred Thousand Pounds," and Prince Perov- 
sky in "Ours." After "Ours" came Sam 
Gerridge, in " Caste," in which, as the young 
plumber, he surprised everybody. In 1896 



John Hare. 221 

it will be remembered that he played Eccles 
in the same play. When the Bancrofts re- 
vived " Caste " at the Haymarket in 1883, 
Mr. Hare lent himself from the St. James's 
Theatre, which he was managing with Mr. 
Kendal, to perform his original character of 
the little Cockney. " How She Loves Him/' 
a forgotten play by Dion Boucicault, followed 
" Caste " in 1867, and in "Box and Cox," the 
same evening, Mr. Hare acted Cox to the 
Box of George Honey and the Mrs. Bouncer 
of Mrs. Leigh Murray. Early in 1868 came 
"Play," with Mr. Hare as the Honourable 
Bruce Fanquehere. Later he appeared as a 
returned convict in "Tame Cats " by Edmund 
Yates ; as Beau Farintosh, in " School ; " 
Dunscombe Dunscombe, in " M. P." At a 
matinee the same year, Mr. Hare played Sir 
Harcourt Courtley, in " London Assurance," 
in an exceptionally strong cast. In Lord 
Lytton's "Money," at the Prince of Wales's 
revival, Mr. Hare was Sir John Vesey, and in 



222 Famous Actors. 

Wilkie Collins's strong drama, " Man and 
Wife/' he was the Sir Patrick Lundie. This 
brings us to the spring of 1874, when " The 
School for Scandal " was produced by the 
Bancrofts, and the part of Sir Peter natu- 
rally fell to the creator of Lord Ptarmigant. 
After this, Mr. Hare left the theatre, to the 
regret of the management, to start on his 
own account. As already stated, Mr. Hare 
opened the Court Theatre on March 13, 1875. 
His career as an actor-manager has ever 
been marked by a desire to do his best, both 
artistically and for the entertainment and 
amusement of the great theatregoing world of 
London. Mr. Hare is modesty personified, 
and disclaims all idea of ever having had any 
notion of educating the public, though he has 
always striven to produce good and high-class 
plays. At the Court Theatre his first man- 
agerial experience lasted until 1879, during 
which time he presented in a noteworthy 
manner such clever plays as Hamilton Aide's 



John Hare. 223 

" A Nine Days 1 Wonder " and W. S. Gilbert's 
" Broken Hearts," in which Mr. and Mrs. 
Kendal and G. W. Anson appeared. 

" As a manager," said Mr. Hare, " I think 
you will observe that I do not hanker after 
all the best parts. On the contrary, through- 
out my twenty-five years' management, I have 
often undertaken characters that many actors 
would have refused. Indeed, some have done 
so, and I have undertaken them myself, for 
the good, I trust and believe, of the cast and 
the author." 

And this is true. Surely the part of Mus- 
tapha, in "Broken Hearts," was designed for 
Mr. Hare, yet he put Anson in it. In 1876, 
in Charles Coghlan's clever adaptation from 
the French, " A Quiet Rubber," Mr. Hare as 
Lord Kilclare achieved one of his greatest 
triumphs. "A Scrap of Paper," from Sar- 
dou's "Les Pattse de Mouche," by J. Pal- 
grave Simpson, wats presented in a revised 
form at the Court, with the Kendals, and Mr. 



224 Famous Actors. 

Hare showed versatility by taking the part 
of the boy, Archie Hamilton. But later he 
appeared as the eccentric Doctor Penguin, 
the entomologist. As the Kendals had to 
leave to fulfil an engagement at the Prince 
of Wales's Theatre, Ellen Terry was speedily 
engaged to act in " Brothers/' which was not 
a success ; so " New Men and Old Acres/ ' 
by Tom Taylor and A. W. Dubourg, was 
revived and drew the town for many months, 
with Ellen Terry as the charming heroine and 
Mr. Hare as Vavasour. This ran until Octo- 
ber, 1877, when a posthumous play by Lord 
Lytton was produced, called "The House of 
Darnley. ,, It secured attention and the whole 
performance was highly praised. In this, Mr. 
Hare acted a very small part, that of Main- 
waring. "Victims," by Tom Taylor, did not 
succeed, and then came that most delightful 
work, the late W. G. Wills's version of "The 
Vicar of Wakefield. " It was Mr. Hare who 
suggested the work of Goldsmith to Wills, 



John Hare. 225 

and practically Mr. Hare was part con- 
structor. 

In 1879 Mr. Hare joined his fortunes with 
the Kendals and assumed the joint manage- 
ment of the St. James's Theatre, previously 
considered an unlucky house. Among the 
most noteworthy productions of this period 
were "The Falcon," by the poet laureate, 
Alfred Tennyson ; " The Money Spinner," 
"The Squire," and "The Ironmaster." In 
1889 Mr. Hare became the manager of the 
Garrick. There one of his greatest successes 
was "A Pair of Spectacles," in which he sub- 
sequently won so much favour in the United 
States. Another splendid and remunerative 
achievement was a revival of "Diplomacy." 

Mr. Hare has visited this country twice, — 
for the first time during the season of 1895- 
96, when the leading feature of his reper- 
tory was Pinero's startling, but on the whole 
unsuccessful, drama, "The Notorious Mrs. 
Ebbsmith." 



CHAPTER XV. 

WILLIAM H. CRANE. 

The season of 1899- 1900 was an unfor- 
tunate one for William H. Crane, and it was 
only through his great personal popularity that 
he was able to tide over without absolute dis- 
aster a series of mishaps that would otherwise 
have seriously embarrassed him. He began 
the season ambitiously with the production 
at Providence, Rhode Island, on September 
25, 1899, of a play by Bronson Howard 
and Brander Matthews, called, " Peter Stuy- 
vesant." It proved to be a tiresome affair, 
commonplace in story and monotonous in 
treatment. It was constructed around the 
single figure of the sturdy, valiant, bad-tem- 
pered but warm-hearted Peter Stuyvesant, 
226 




Copyright 1900 by Elmer Checkering. Boston. 

WILLIAM H. CRANE 

As David Harum in '• David Harum." 



William H. Crane. 227 

governor under the Dutch regime of that 
locality which is now New York. The ob- 
ject of the play was to show this testy auto- 
crat in his historical environment, and to 
portray his sharply contrasted moods. These 
things were well enough done during part of 
the first act. Unfortunately, the other three 
acts were merely repetitions. Mr. Crane was 
praised generously for his impersonation of 
the name part. His vigour and buoyancy 
were abundant, but he could not sufficiently 
conceal the modern man in his acting to pre- 
vent his Stuyvesant from conveying an im- 
pression of anachronism. Harking back to 
a seventeenth-century Dutchman, after years 
of bustling, hustling, middle-aged American 
citizens, proved too great a strain on Mr. 
Crane's mimetic powers. 

After trying vainly to force " Peter Stuy- 
vesant " on a public that would have nothing 
to do with it, Mr. Crane had recourse to a 
farce, made over from the German by Mi- 



228 Famous Actors. 

chael Morton, and called, "A Rich Man's 
Son." This was brought out in New York on 
October 31,1 899. The rich man's son in this 
case was a chap full of fads and fancies, a 
poser with ideals, who, never having known 
poverty, despised mightily his father's cold 
cash. To cure him of this alarming mental 
condition, the father pretended to be the 
victim of unfortunate speculations and retired 
to disreputable lodgings, taking the family, 
including the son, with him. This realistic 
initiation into the value of the mighty dollar 
soon bred in the erring son a proper respect 
for the advantages of wealth. Such was the 
plot of "A Rich Man's Son," which as an 
emergency filler was permissible, but which 
as a standby for an entire season was hardly 
up to the requirements. In brief, it was 
old-fashioned, clumsy, and wholly lacking in 
distinction and finish. Even with these 
drawbacks, it might have made a fair im- 
pression if it had been acted with a vim and 



William H. Crane. 229 

incisiveness so essential to this style of enter- 
tainment. But Mr. Crane's company had 
apparently been trained for better things, 
and it made a mess of the little merit there 
was in the vehicle. 

In this company, however, there was a 
young woman, short in stature, with a pretty 
face, yellowish hair, and a name not easy to 
master but hard to forget, — Sandol Milliken. 
She played what in England would be called 
a slavey part. That is to say, Miss Milliken 
changed her own prepossessing self into a 
dirty-faced, slatternly dressed tenement waif, 
a conventional enough character, though it 
did not seem such amid the dreariness of 
"A Rich Man's Son." She enriched her 
sketch — for it was only a sketch, such a 
one as Michael Wolff might have drawn — 
with delicate detail, natural humour, tender 
sympathy, and artistic sincerity. There were 
few honours for any one in " A Rich Man's 
Son," and it did seem a bit ungenerous for 



230 Famous Actors. 

this comparatively obscure actress to seize 
them all. 

The gentle art of farcing consists to a con- 
siderable degree in putting flesh and blood 
characters in hopelessly absurd situations, 
and then standing off and seeing what will 
happen. Mr. Morton assuredly had the 
hopelessly absurd situations. He knew that 
they were good ones, for he had seen them 
worked on the stage time and time again. 
But when it came to the flesh and blood 
characters, he stumbled, and in trying to 
stand off for the purpose of seeing what 
would happen, he fell down completely. In 
other words, Mr. Morton's situations, though 
old, would have done well enough, had they 
been dexterously handled by a facile writer 
of farce. But Mr. Morton had very little 
finesse, and no idea at all of subtilty or sug- 
gestion. He encumbered his action with 
reiterated explanations, and killed one's in- 
terest by constantly coddling one's compre- 



William H. Crane. 231 

hension. As Peter Dibdin, the notoriously 
wealthy father, Mr. Crane was the same Mr. 
Crane that he always has been in characters 
of the blustering, fussy type, — authoritative 
in his own blunt way, a comedian by the 
force of personality, sometimes almost by 
main strength. 

Fortune did finally deign to smile on Mr. 
Crane, however, when the opportunity came 
for him to transfer to the stage that famous 
citizen of New York State, David Harum. 
The dramatisation of Edward Noyes West- 
cott's novel was something of a syndicate 
affair. The first version was by R. and M. 
W. Hitchcock, and this was first acted in 
Rochester, New York, on April 9, 1900. Be- 
fore the piece reached New York the follow- 
ing October, it had fallen into the ever open 
hands of Edward E. Rose, who moulded it 
into a closer resemblance to a play. Even 
at that, " David Harum " was by no means 
a marvel of dramatic architecture, but it 



232 Famous Actors, 

served its purpose as a setting for Mr. Crane's 
admirable impersonation. Mr. Crane's por- 
trayal of the horse-trading financier and 
homely philosopher was a lifelike and satis- 
fying embodiment of the idea of Harum that 
one got from Mr. Westcott's book. Exactly 
the man in outward aspect, Mr. Crane's 
acting carried the similitude much farther. 
It was impossible to find missing a tone, a 
gesture, a hint of mischievous fun or a gleam 
of sound sense. Regarding " David Harum " 
as a play, Edward A. Dithmar wrote : 

" A play which enables an actor to make 
such a triumph must contain merit of an un- 
common sort. Good actors are encountering 
disaster every day because of bad plays. This 
dramatisation of ' David Harum 9 is, indeed, 
rather na'ff, and, in one episode, a clumsy 
piece of work, but the stage treatment of that 
never-to-be-forgotten transaction in horseflesh 
with Deacon Perry is cleverly managed, while 
the famous revelation on Christmas Day of 



William H. Crane. 233 

David's long-standing debt to the widow of 
1 Billy P.,' and his theatrical payment of it, are 
brought about rather more ingeniously and 
naturally than in the book. 

"The dramatisation has the sound merit 
of preserving, in an intelligent theatrical 
form, every detail of the book relating to 
David that could be made use of in a play. 
As for the rest of the story, the twisting and 
perversion it has been subjected to do not 
matter. The transformation of Mary Blake 
into a quixotic young amazon and the chief 
opponent of David, the antagonist, in short, 
in certain scenes, is unfortunate only because 
the part is acted by gentle Katherine Flor- 
ence, whose style of beauty, voice, and clothes 
do not seem to fit it. This endangers the 
interest of the piece, however, only in one 
violent scene of cross purposes, which in 
both its essence and superficial details is 
unlike anything in real life. 

" Otherwise the current flows smoothly. 



234 Famous Actors. 

even in those few passages when delightful 
David is not in sight and hearing. The sale 
of the bay horse to the deacon is the princi- 
pal incident of Act I., while the last act, 
not counting the development of the slight 
amatory interest, is occupied with the settle- 
ment of the affairs of Widow Cullom. The 
intermediate act exhibits David, like another 
Mr. Boffin, making a bad name for himself so 
that truth and Cupid may ultimately triumph. 
All of his famous aphorisms are put to good 
use, and they all hit the mark. One laughs 
immoderately sometimes, and in one passage 
susceptible persons will find their eyes filling 
with tears. No better praise than this could 
be given to a popular stage-piece." 




HENRY MILLER 
As Sidney Carton in " The Only Way." 



I 



\ 



CHAPTER XVI. 

HENRY MILLER IN MELODRAMA. 

The diversity of opinion regarding Henry 
Miller's rank as an actor is most curious. 
Although his standing in the East is excel- 
lent, in that section of the country he has 
never gained the personal regard — if I may 
express it thus indefinitely — which has been 
so freely showered on other players, mayhap 
of inferior talent. He is not what is known 
as " strong " with the public. In the West, 
and especially in San Francisco, where for 
several summers Mr. Miller played stock 
engagements, he is ranked as second, prob- 
ably, to none of the younger generation of 
players. It must be acknowledged, too, that 
San Francisco has had a far better oppor- 
2 35 



236 Famous Actors. 

t unity to judge Mr. Miller's capabilities than 
has the East. Here he is known almost 
exclusively by his work in " Liberty Hall," 
" Sowing the Wind," " Heartease," " The 
Only Way," and " Richard Savage." There 
he has appeared in a wide range of imper- 
sonations, including all the recent London 
successes, such plays as " Lord and Lady 
Algy," and " Brother Officers/' and even the 
classics, among them " Hamlet." 

What has prevented Mr. Miller's solid 
establishment, it seems to me, has been his 
inability up to date to secure a strong, com- 
pelling play, combined with a certain lack of 
personal magnetism that has kept him from 
forcing to success a play of inferior merit. 
He has always had interesting plays, and 
plays worthy of consideration, but he has 
never yet been fortunate enough to secure 
one of those dramas that sweep irresistibly 
everything before them. " The Only Way " 
was in many respects a fine melodrama, but 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 237 

it lacked that quality of conviction which 
would have made it an overwhelming suc- 
cess. " Richard Savage " was a better play 
than " The Only Way." Its literary quality 
was thoroughly good and incomparably su- 
perior to that of the average commercially 
successful romantic drama. Yet " Richard 
Savage " also lacked compelling force. 

It is the monotonous task of the chronicler 
of stage history to record that such and such 
a play had its original production in London 
at such and such a date, for the American 
stage for many seasons back has been firmly 
attached to the London theatrical band-wagon, 
a somewhat fortunate circumstance, it must 
be acknowledged, inasmuch as all the plays 
really worth seeing — with one or two ex- 
ceptions — have been importations. Such 
was " The Only Way," which Freeman Wills 
dramatised from Charles Dickens's novel, " A 
Tale of Two Cities. " Before Henry Miller 
acted it in the United States, this melodrama 



238 Famous Actors. 

of the French Revolution had served firmly 
to establish Martin Harvey as a London 
theatrical manager. He brought out the 
play at Sir Henry Irving's Lyceum Theatre, 
London, on February 16, 1899. Mr. Miller 
first appeared in the drama at the Herald 
Square Theatre, New York, on September 
16, 1899. 

The leading idea of "A Tale of Two 
Cities " provided about as fine a theme for 
dramatic exposition as could fall to the lot 
of any playwright to handle. A man whose 
life had been, from a worldly point of view, 
a complete failure, who was conscious, more- 
over, of lost opportunities and moral worth- 
lessness, was moved by his great love for a 
woman, to sacrifice his life in order to ensure 
her happiness. She loved and was loved in 
turn by a rival, who strangely resembled the 
dissolute hero, and him the hero successfully 
impersonated, perishing by the guillotine, as- 
suring himself by this supreme deed, that 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 239 

his life had not been in vain, his last words 
being, " It is a far, far better thing that I do 
than I have ever done ; it is a far, far better 
rest that I go to than I have ever known." 

Although Henry Miller starred in " The 
Only Way," "The Only Way" was by no 
means a star play. It had too many strong 
characters to make it possible for one actor 
consistently to focus all the attention on 
himself. In the matter of diversified inter- 
est, "The Only Way" differed widely from 
the ordinary romantic drama. Usually one 
has but a single hero to bother about ; in 
"The Only Way," however, there were two, 
— Carton and Darnay, — and, of course, each 
hero had his own heroine. The fact that 
"The Only Way" was derived from a novel 
as widely read as " A Tale of Two Cities " 
also brought responsibilities to every actor. 
There could be no slighted parts. Each 
character — however unimportant its place 
in the play — had to be truthfully and artis- 



240 Famous Actors. 

tically portrayed. The spectator knew each 
and every one of them as old frier ds, and 
he demanded that old friends should be re- 
spectfully treated. 

What " The Only Way " required, to be 
thoroughly effective, was a company of stars. 
It was not enough that Carton should have 
been able at certain points to command the 
centre of the stage. There were many mo- 
ments when the exigencies of composite effect 
required that Carton should be forced to the 
background, that he should be driven out of 
sight, the dramatic interest for the time being 
captured by another person. Unfortunately 
this did not happen in the presentation of the 
play that I saw. The company was weak, and 
consequently Mr. Wills's play, which, after 
all, was melodrama only a trifle better than 
the average, suffered greatly in effect. Pos- 
sibly, acted up to the limit of effect, the play 
might have approached tragedy in its appeal. 
Without doubt the idealistic self-sacrifice of 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 241 

Sydney Carton should have been sweepingly 
pathetic. Comprehending fully that noble 
spirit, the spectator would have been up- 
lifted ; his faith in humanity would have been 
strengthened, and dramatic art would have 
been enriched with an inspiring creation. 
Mr. Miller's presentation of the character 
tended toward that ideal. His first impres- 
sion was very strong, and his playing of the 
difficult intoxication scene vivid and yet sub- 
tle. There was danger of mawkishness and 
sentimentality, but the actor escaped it. He 
suggested strongly the sweetness and tender- 
ness of Carton's nature, and also his humour 
and grim fatalism. As the play progressed, 
Mr. Miller frequently reached the heart, and 
during the final scenes, one felt continually 
the impress on his imagination. What was 
needed to complete the personation, to give 
it full scope, to render it thoroughly effective, 
was environment, — atmosphere, as James A. 
Heme called it. This atmosphere could only 



242 Famous Actors. 

have been supplied by a cast great through- 
out. 

In the important particular of retelling the 
plot of « A Tale of Two Cities," Mr. Wills 
did very well indeed. He built up a straight- 
forward melodrama of the refined type. So 
carefully did he tune his action that, in condi- 
tions slightly more strenuous, brought about 
by acting a trifle less commonplace, his 
melodrama would, perhaps, have acquired 
tragic dignity. However, it was not 
tragedy as it stood. Carton's self-sacrifice 
was only theatrically pathetic. It did not 
create in one a tear-compelling grief. The 
exact reason for this was difficult to state. It 
might have been because of a defect in the 
construction of the play. It might have been 
that Mr. Miller lacked somewhat in imagina- 
tive idealism and suggestiveness. It might 
have been to a certain extent due to the cru- 
dity of the ensemble of the final scene, with 
its mob that howled spasmodically in an illu- 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 243 

sion ■ destroying monotone, and its French 
nobles whose aristocracy was scarcely for an 
instant in evidence. 

Mr. Wills began his play with a prologue in 
which was set forth the events that led to Doc- 
tor Manette's long imprisonment in the Bas- 
tile. In the first act we made the acquaintance 
of the dissolute Sydney Carton, of Stryver, 
Defarge, — a combination of Dicken's De- 
farge and the relentless Madame Defarge, — 
Darnay, and Mime, an interpolated character 
founded on the little seamstress, who went to 
the guillotine with Carton, and introduced by 
Mr. Wills for the sole purpose of hopelessly 
loving Carton. In this act the incident of the 
famous trial of Darnay in the English court, 
on the charge of treason, was related ; Dar- 
nay's strange resemblance to Carton was ex- 
plained, and Gabelle's letter, which led finally 
to the return to France of Darnay and his 
arrest as the Marquis de St. Evremonde, came 
into view. 



244 Famous Actors, 

In the next act we met Mr. Lorry and were 
witnesses of the betrothal of Lucie Manette 
and Darnay. The act closed with Darnay's 
secret departure for France. Between Acts 
II. and III. there was a serious break. At 
the opening of the third act, without any 
especial reason therefor, we found ourselves 
before the revolutionary tribunal. Through 
the pleading of Carton, Darnay was at first 
acquitted, only to be rearrested after De- 
farge's denunciation and finally condemned 
to death. The last act showed how Carton 
succeeded in taking Darnay's place as a con- 
demned prisoner, and the curtain fell on a 
tableau, picturing Carton just before the 
moment of execution. 

The prologue was, as it should have been, 
a little play by itself, — one of considera- 
ble effectiveness, too. The drama proper 
started slowly, and was not fully under 
way till well toward the end of the sec- 
ond act. The tribunal scene was finely 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 245 

conceived, and was unusually strong in the 
quality of effectively contrasted emotion, and 
the combining of the acquittal and subse- 
quent condemnation of Darnay into a single 
episode was of the greatest theatrical value. 
" Richard Savage " appealed so strongly to 
the intellect that one was constantly wonder- 
ing why it did not touch the emotions as 
well. The spectator got positive mental 
enjoyment from the passing of the action, 
but the emotional thrill that is the final 
dramatic test was only here and there in 
evidence. There was but one cause for such 
a result, and to find it one had to revert to 
the dramatist. I do not believe that Made- 
line Lucette Ryley herself felt Richard Sav- 
age as a reality. I think that he appealed 
to her, not as a human being, but as a dra- 
matic possibility ; and I am of the opinion 
that she wrote her play, not so much with 
the idea of portraying Richard Savage as a 
man, as of providing a many-sided instru- 



246 Famous Actors. 

ment on which an actor might display his 
virtuosity. The result was a study of char- 
acter that interested one while it did not 
convince one. Indeed, so much was one in- 
terested that he felt personally responsible 
for not having been convinced, and he tried 
to fix the blame for this, not on the play, but 
on himself. 

In all the surface qualities the drama was 
admirable. The eighteenth century atmos- 
phere was splendidly maintained ; the charac- 
ter drawing throughout was versatile without 
being eccentric ; the action was constant, but 
without melodramatic rush, and the climaxes, 
all of them, had the valuable theatrical qual- 
ity of the slightly unexpected. A wholly 
unexpected climax is usually — nay, almost 
invariably — weak, but a climax that has been 
carefully worked up, and that slips off into an 
unperceived channel is always highly effect- 
ive. Mrs. Ryley's comedy had both humour 
and dramatic strength. The dinner scene in 



Henry Miller in Melodrama, 247 

the third act, for example, was remarkable, 
constantly flashing with wit, and sparkling 
ever, yet having always in evidence tension 
and foreboding. One felt that all this 
laughing and joking was on the brink of a 
rumbling volcano momentarily threatening 
eruption ; and when eruption did come, the 
spectator was ready to be moved by it. 

" Richard Savage" was a difficult play to 
classify. Were it not for its historically un- 
avoidable tragic ending, it would have come 
readily under the head of comedy ; but, as 
was the case with Clyde Fitch's " Nathan 
Hale" and " Barbara Frietchie," the some- 
what illogical death debarred the comedy 
idea. Still, in spite of their endings, none 
of these dramas was by any means serious 
enough to be termed tragedy. The final 
death was, in each case, merely incidental to 
the action ; it was in no sense an essen- 
tial, a necessary atonement for sin, an inex- 
orable decree penned by fate. Therefore, 



248 Famous Actors, 

the only thing left was to term " Richard 
Savage " a melodrama, which one did, how- 
ever, with reservations. Melodrama, in the 
ordinary acceptance, means theatricalism. 
"Richard Savage " was more than a merely 
theatrical play. It was a study of character 
as well. 

Just how much historical basis Mrs. Ryley 
had for the view that she took of Richard 
Savage's character might be an interesting 
subject for discussion, but such a discussion 
could have no bearing whatever on the value 
of the play that Mrs. Ryley wrote with 
Richard Savage as the subject. She por- 
trayed a hero, and whether he was " Dick " 
Savage to our minds was not the point. The 
nub of the matter lay here : Was he an 
effective dramatic character ? Was he plainly 
delineated ? Was he logically developed ? 
Did he act well ? Had he the breath of life ? 
Was he convincing ? Did he arouse sympa- 
thetic interest ? 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 249 

Mrs. Ryley declared as beyond dispute the 
truth of Savage's claim that he was the illegit- 
imate son of Mrs. Brett, formerly Countess 
of Macclesfield, and Savage's whole effort in 
the play was bent toward gaining public rec- 
ognition of this claim. Mrs. Brett was stead- 
fastly opposed to him, and brought to bear 
to circumvent him every possible influence. 
His poems found no publishers ; his plays 
were refused at the theatres ; the one man 
who could establish his birthright was incar- 
cerated in a madhouse. Finally, Savage, 
beaten down to the last ditch, broken in 
health, poverty-stricken, was wrongfully ac- 
cused of murder, taken to Newgate Prison, 
where he died just as a pardon reached him. 

Mrs. Ryley's conception of Richard Savage 
was sympathetically effective and dramatically 
strong in theory rather than in fact. It was 
not, however, strikingly original. Poor but 
proud was the popular key-note, dissolute to 
a mild degree, high-spirited to the bitter end, 



250 Famous Actors. 

chivalrous except where his mother was con- 
cerned, loving the maid of his choice with 
idealism and with supreme devotion, generous 
even to the giving away of his last crust, 
witty, keen, a daredevil for bravery and smiler 
in the face of death. With such a character 
the inevitable death scene might be consid- 
ered as not wholly without justification, 
were one disposed to set aside involuntary 
irritation at what on the surface seemed to be 
the wanton cutting off of a good and deserv- 
ing fellow, and willing to seek a reason 
in the subtler regions beneath the surface. 
Savage died in triumph. His enemies had 
all been conquered. Even his mother had 
come to terms, and tacitly, at least, surren- 
dered. His love was sweet and fresh and 
pure. 

Suppose Richard Savage had lived. What 
then ? He was a good fellow. Yes. But 
his habits were loose. He had a beastly 
temper. He was proud to perverseness. 



Henry Miller in Melodrama. 251 

Finally, his lady-love was a dear girl, but 
she was nothing more than that. Ann Old- 
field would have been a far better mate for 
him, and she would have known how to have 
managed him. No, Savage was not a man 
to keep to the straight and narrow path ; he 
was too impatient of restraint. He would 
have married his Elizabeth, and they would 
have been happy for a time. At length, 
however, her unmitigated sweetness would 
have cloyed his appetite, and he would have 
broken away from her, made her miserable, 
and wrecked absolutely a conventional life. 
Viewing the case in this light, Mrs. Ryley 
was kind to kill poor Dick. She probably 
saved some one a lot of trouble. 

I found the play interesting always, — pic- 
turesque in the garret scene of the first act, 
though the exposition of the plot seemed 
both clumsy and blind ; tinged with pathos, 
though not absolutely convincing, in the 
second act, which showed the first interview 



252 Famous Actors. 

between mother and son ; strongly dramatic, 
thrilling, and even absorbing, in the third 
and fourth acts, — the sparkle of wit in the 
dinner scene of the third act, and the brilliant 
and unlooked-for climax of the fourth act 
being notably excellent points. The pathos 
of the death scene of the last act did not 
hold me as it should have, though it was 
well imagined. 

Mr. Miller realised Richard Savage, par- 
ticularly the comedy side of the character 
with its occasional glimpses of pathos, with 
satisfying completeness. The dinner scene 
was played with especial force and brilliancy, 
and there was one moment in the fourth act 
— the scene between Savage and Elizabeth 
Wilbur, in which he refused to allow her to 
share his poverty — when Mr. Miller was 
distinctly great. 




JOHN BLAIR. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

JOHN BLAIR AND THE INDEPENDENT 
THEATRE. 

An interesting feature of the theatrical 
season of 1899-1900 was the presentation 
in several Eastern cities of a series of plays 
of certain literary value, but plays which, 
from their originality or unconventionally, 
were manifestly "unpopular," and, therefore, 
never likely to be considered by the commer- 
cial theatre manager. I am not blaming the 
theatre manager for his conservatism. From 
his view-point he is absolutely right. As he 
would proudly tell you, if you should ask 
him, he is not in the business for his health. 
When a man talks that way, there is no 
use in wasting time arguing with him about 
253 



254 Famous Actors. 

art. However, the movement started by 
John Blair, and completed by two or three 
other devoted and optimistic souls, was none 
the less grateful and scarcely the less im- 
portant because it did not stir very deeply 
the helter-skelter theatregoing public. Five 
dramas were produced, — some of them worth 
while, others not worth while, but all of 
them providing material for disputation. 
Every play acted did at least suggest an 
idea above the mere wooing of dollars. 
They were honest efforts, and an honest 
effort, even though it prove a bore, is im- 
measurably more comforting to one's self- 
respect than a dishonest effort, which nine 
times out of ten is a bore also. 

The dramas produced in this course of 
modern plays covered a wide field. They 
were "El Gran Galeoto," from the Spanish 
of Jos6 Eschegaray ; "Les Tenants/' in 
the English version called " Ties," from the 
French of Paul Hervieu; Henrik Ibsen's 



John Blair. 255 

"The Master Builder ;" "The Storm, ,, from 
the Russian of Alexander Ostrovsky; and 
"The Heather Field," by Edward Martyn. 
It was notable, as showing the impression 
that it is possible for actors to make 
when they are provided with material that 
is actable, that two players were greatly 
advanced professionally through this course 
of plays, — Mr. Blair, the originator of the 
course, and Miss Florence Kahn, a wholly 
unknown actress, who came immediately into 
the public view with force and vividness. 

John Blair was born in New York, and 
studied acting with Franklin Sargent, making 
his first public appearance at the Berkeley 
Lyceum, New York, on December 8, 1893, 
in a student production of " Left at the 
Post." One of his earliest professional ap- 
pearances was in the New York production 
of "The City of Pleasure," at the Empire 
Theatre, on September 2, 1895. During the 
season of 1896-97 he was with Olga Neth- 



256 Famous Actors. 

ersole in " Carmen " and u The Wife of 
Scarlii. ,, The following season he appeared 
in the productions of "El Gran Galeoto " 
and "John Gabriel Borkman," by the Cri- 
terion Independent Theatre at Madison 
Square Theatre, New York, and later he 
supported Madame Janauschek in "What 
Dreams May Come, ,, acting Roger Hazleton. 
During the season of 1898-99 he was with 
Julia Marlowe in " Colinette," and he also 
acted Orlando to Miss Marlowe's Rosalind 
in "As You Like It." In the spring of 1899 
he gave a special performance of Ibsen's 
"Ghosts" at the Carnegie Lyceum in New 
York, and the following fall came the series 
of modern plays. Mr. Blair supported Grace 
George in "The Countess Chiffon," early in 
1900, and shortly after that appeared as 
Vinicius in "Quo Vadis," at the Herald 
Square Theatre, New York. 

The English version of " El Gran Galeoto " 
was made by Maude Banks. Eschegaray's 



JoJm Blair. 257 

drama belonged distinctively to what is known 
as the modern school, and in a general classi- 
fication would be placed in the same category 
with the works of Ibsen, Sudermann, and 
Hauptmann. The distinguishable features 
of this school are quiet action, deep-search- 
ing psychology, and uncompromising logic. 
The decree of fate is written down to the 
last bitter period, and the hand of Nemesis 
is never stayed by false platitudes nor mis- 
conceived sentimentality. This unvarying 
attitude of steadfast adherence to truth and 
reality has brought upon the modern drama 
the charge of pessimism. It is claimed 
that the bright and joyous things of life are 
neglected for those that are sordid and low 
and disconcerting ; that the tragedy of life 
is emphasised, that the dull monotone of 
existence alone is painted, and light and sun- 
shine are excluded from the picture. This 
charge of pessimism is to a degree unanswer- 
able. The modern drama, in its desire to get 



258 Famous Actors. 

as far away as possible from the conventions 
that are second nature to the stage in gen- 
eral, has persistently presented man face to 
face with conditions which he himself may 
have caused, but which he is powerless to 
alleviate. Man impotent is the tragedy of 
human existence, a tragedy which reaches 
home to every heart with the tremendous 
force of actual experience. This ceaseless 
struggle of the race in general toward an 
indefinite something, a struggle charged with 
deepest pathos, the modern drama has taken 
for its theme, and from it has drawn its 
conclusions. These conclusions may be pes- 
simistic, but life itself, when moulded by 
passion, avarice, and personal selfishness, is 
pessimistic. 

The force of the modern drama comes 
from its fidelity to life, — its realism, if you 
please, — and its absolute sincerity. Its char- 
acters are not heroic figures nor dastardly 
villains ; they are simply men and women, 



John Blair, 259 

more often than not well meaning, whose 
disastrous transgressions are blunders of 
judgment, mistakes caused by ignorance or 
prejudice, rather than the evil doings of 
deliberate purpose. This state of affairs 
was excellently illustrated in " El Gran 
Galeoto." There was not a personage in 
the drama whose purposes could in any way 
be construed as intentionally mischievous. 
On the other hand, Don Severo and his wife 
Mercedes, the provokers of all the trouble, 
were actuated by the highest motives. They 
wished to save Don Severn's brother Julian 
from disgrace, his wife Christina from a 
scandal, and the family from dishonour. 
Their mistake was one of judgment, for their 
suspicious natures found sin where no sin 
existed. They got it into their heads that 
Ernest, the poet, dreamer, and philosopher, 
whom Don Julian had taken into his family, 
and whom he regarded as his son, was the 
lover of Christina, Julian's youthful wife. 



260 Famous Actors. 

They could not understand the pure-minded 
and perfectly apparent affection that the 
man and woman held for one another. So 
they told their suspicions to Don Julian. He 
scoffed at them, but the poison, insidious and 
deadly, struck home. He, too, became dis- 
trustful, and his vision was perverted. The 
end of it all ? Simple enough. The man and 
the woman, both suffering under a common 
sense of injustice, were finally actually driven 
into one another's arms, and the love, which 
at first was an imagination, in the end be- 
came a reality. 

As a play, " El Gran Galeoto " was beau- 
tifully put together. It moved forward with 
absolute precision. There were no side-lights 
to detract one's attention from the main 
theme, no extraneous effects for the sake of 
colour or movement or contrast. The action 
started with the rise of the curtain, advanced 
steadily and naturally to a climax at the end 
of the second act, and the catastrophe fol- 



John Blair, 261 

lowed logically and inevitably. The dramatic 
interest, on the contrary, increased in inten- 
sity and power up to the very end, and 
Ernests speech of manly and courageous de- 
fiance of public opinion, which preceded the 
final curtain, thrilled and throbbed with the 
keenest and most searching emotion. In- 
deed, the culminating power of the last act 
was tremendous. 

The interpretation of the drama was emi- 
nently satisfactory and of remarkable even- 
ness. There was evident in every character 
the utmost sincerity, and there was no play- 
ing to the gallery. Mr. Blair's Ernest was 
a well-defined creation, finely idealised, and 
competently resourceful. The actor was 
strongly dramatic, and his range of expres- 
sion wide and varied. He was espe- 
cially successful in reproducing the imagina- 
tive atmosphere that was so necessary to 
a proper understanding of the character of 
Ernest. In the climax of the last act Mr. 



262 Famous Actors. 

Blair completely annihilated self, and one 
forgot the actor entirely in the overwhelming 
force of the dramatic situation. 

The English version of " Les Tenailles" 
was made by George Peabody Eustis and 
Paul Kester. " Ties " proved to be a prob- 
lem play of the most argumentative kind. It 
was drama of very few moments of action, 
violent or otherwise, but the appeal to the 
emotions was at all times keen and intense. 
"Ties" represented the conflict between a 
husband and his wife. The husband in the 
eyes of the world was a model citizen. He 
conducted himself properly in every respect. 
He lived moderately, and, aside from an un- 
pleasant disposition to assert his rights on 
every possible occasion, he was a good neigh- 
bour. He was, however, absolutely lacking 
in one important essential, — sympathy. His 
fault was not so much selfishness, although 
he did methodically fix his daily routine to 
suit himself ; neither was his fault a lack of 



John Blair. 263 

respect for his wife. A woman can forget 
selfishness if it be concealed by deference 
and kindness ; she can even forgive a man for 
not loving her if he fail to love her in a 
spirit of consideration and regret. Robert 
Fergan's wreck of happiness was wholly due 
to his thoroughly unsympathetic nature ; he 
had no milk of human kindness, and he was 
unsusceptible to the touch of sentiment. 
The hard indifference, which absence of sen- 
timent engenders in a man, no woman can 
endure. She will rebel against it as long 
as she remains a woman. 

Fergan had married because it was a social 
convention, and to his small, narrow mind 
the fact that the world at large and that his 
friends at home approved of what he was 
doing was reason enough why he should enter 
the marriage state. The woman in the case 
was of little account. She would love him, — 
that was her duty ; she would make his home 
happy, — - that, too, was her duty ; she would 



264 Famous Actors. 

be subservient, — again, it was her duty. Of 
his own duty to her he thought nothing be- 
yond the mere external of keeping himself 
physically undefiled. 

That was the condition presented in 
"Ties." It was a sane enough problem, and 
the events of the play were common enough 
property. We in this country might have 
developed a different action from the prem- 
ises, for the sneaking lover is an unsympa- 
thetic personage in our eyes. But the wreck 
of the home, the despair of the wife, the 
growing severity of the husband until he be- 
came positively unbearable, would have been 
the same. In " Ties," Irene, the wife, know- 
ing her love for the outsider, pleads that her 
husband permit her to be divorced. He re- 
fuses, not because such a course would mean 
disgrace to the woman, but because it would 
discommode his plans. So the unwilling 
wife seeks her lover clandestinely. A child 
is born, whom Fergan believes to be his own, 



John Blair. 265 

and for ten years he lives in ignorance of the 
dishonour that has fallen on his household. 
In the meantime the lover has died, and the 
woman has fixed all the passion of her nature 
on an adoring affection for her son. The 
final conflict comes when Fergan, still pursu- 
ing his pigheaded stubbornness, and standing 
as immovably on his rights as a father as ten 
years before he stood on his rights as a hus- 
band, declares that the boy shall be separated 
from his mother and be sent to school. The 
woman, in an agony of apprehension and as 
a last resort, reveals the truth of the child's 
parentage. Fergan's rage is terrible, and 
fear of consequences alone keeps him from 
killing his wife. But he will divorce her ; 
he will drive her from his house ; he will 
pile disgrace upon her and upon her off- 
spring. Now is the wife's chance for re- 
venge. She refuses to be divorced, and the 
husband has no evidence that will stand be- 
fore the law. At last, there dawns on him a 



266 Famous Actors. 

glimmering of the great wrong that he has 
committed. There is nothing for him to do 
but accept the inevitable, to keep the woman 
whom he had once refused to let leave him, 
and to give a name to the child that is not 
his own. 

As between play and play " Ties " was not 
to be compared with "El Gran Galeoto. ,, 
The Spanish drama illustrated, under modern 
conditions, the sweeping, irresistible force of 
fate. The French play, on the other hand, 
lacked the underground current of blind 
"must." The conditions were adroit enough 
not to seem palpably artificial, but, neverthe- 
less, the mind constantly recognised that the 
characters were being held to their environ- 
ment by the strong will of the dramatist. In 
"El Gran Galeoto " one saw the personages 
of the play helpless under the insidious poison 
of slander. He saw the husband fighting 
desperately but hopelessly against a growing 
suspicion of his wife's faithlessness. He saw 



John Blair, 267 

the wife torn in spite of herself from her 
husband's arms and thrown into those of her 
lover. He saw the lover himself battling 
against dishonouring the man who had been 
a father to him. Under the conditions so 
powerfully represented by the dramatist, one 
could not for the life of him imagine how 
matters could have turned out differently 
than they did. 

But this conviction did come in "Ties." 
The spectator, while he recognised Robert 
Fergan's essential fidelity to human nature, 
rebelled instinctively against his exaggerated 
perverseness and stupidity. He was contin- 
ually out of sympathy with the wife, because 
she kept her place in the household of so 
thoroughly disagreeable a man. He would 
have been only too glad to have commended 
her for running away with her lover. Finally, 
he had no patience at all with the lover, who 
had not backbone enough to cut the knot, 
either by killing the husband or by clearing 



268 Famous Actors. 

out with the woman. Of course, any one of 
those possibilities would have put an end to 
the problem that was vital to Mr. Hervieu's 
play, but the mere fact that each one of them 
was a possibility showed conclusively that 
the drama, with all its striking stagecraft, 
sweeping emotion, and fine character draw- 
ing, lacked convincing power. 

Mr. Blair had a far better opportunity to 
display his strength as the husband in 
"Ties" than he did in the negative char- 
acter of the poetic lover in " El Gran Gale- 
oto." He developed the character of Fergan 
perfectly, taking it from the mass of generali- 
sations, amid which the dramatist had imag- 
ined it, and establishing it as an individual. 
His cold-blooded reserve was magnificent, 
and the two great moments of sweeping 
rage were made exceedingly effective, Mr. 
Blair picturing the passion of a man, not 
the wild, meaningless ranting of a traditional 
puppet. 



John Blair. 269 

It was a regrettable fact that after the 
presentation of " Ties," Mr. Blair's connec- 
tion with the course of plays ceased, internal 
dissensions arising, — a misfortune that seems 
common to all movements that aim to spell 
art with capitals, — which caused him to with- 
draw from the enterprise. In the cast of 
Ibsen's " The Master Builder," therefore, the 
only one that remained of the original com- 
pany was Miss Kahn. It required no very 
great discernment to see that the perform- 
ances of this play were unsuccessful as far 
as the public at large was concerned. There 
were two prominent causes for this. One was 
that the complex, symbolic, and argumenta- 
tive drama is actable only under exceptional 
circumstances, and the other was that these 
exceptional circumstances were not present 
at the performances under consideration. 
The thought of the spectator was not guided 
by actors who were interpreters. Miss Kahn 
did display this illuminating force. No one 



270 Famous Actors. 

failed to comprehend her meaning, and when 
at the very end of the drama, she thrilled one 
with her shouts of triumph as the Master 
Builder climbed upward, seeming under her 
inspiration about to accomplish again the 
impossible, about to realise again her ideal 
in all its completeness, — at this supreme 
moment a flood of light was thrown into the 
dark corners of Ibsen's conception. 

With the average quality of its acting, 
however, the drama proved far too subtle 
for the casual audience, only superficially 
acquainted with the philosophy and method 
of the Norwegian dramatist. Those that 
previously knew nothing about "The Mas- 
ter Builder," or about Ibsen, either, except 
that somebody or other declared that he 
was a genius, — found the drama veritable 
nonsense. Giving " The Master Builder " in 
this country without a preliminary course in 
the Ibsen drama, was not unlike plunging a 
child, who had just learned his A, B, Cs, into 



Jo/m Blair. 2JI 

the midst of the Greek alphabet. An under- 
standing of Ibsen is not to be secured in two 
hours or from a single play, certainly not from 
such a play as "The Master Builder," which 
comprehends so much as to be almost in- 
comprehensible. 

Yet Ibsen is not a fool, and he is not crazy. 
One would not choose him as a genial com- 
panion, perhaps, for he has a keen scent for 
the social cesspool ; and after locating it, 
instead of killing the foul odour with disin- 
fectants, as a good citizen probably would 
do, he uncovers the noisomeness and spreads 
it before the horrified nostrils of mankind. 
No, he is not a genial companion, but he 
usually has something to say, and he is never 
afraid to say it. Moreover, he is more likely 
than not to have the truth on his side. There 
is tragic power in this Halvard Solness, the 
Master Builder, who, after fighting his way 
to worldly success, ruthlessly crushing every- 
body and everything that crossed his path, 



272 Famous Actors. 

at last finds himself face to face with the 
same fate he has so remorselessly dealt to 
others, finds himself in his turn blocking the 
path of youth and in danger of being over- 
whelmed by some one stronger than himself. 
Standing alone and in despair, for his ambition 
has devoured every kindly impulse and killed 
every affection, he seizes as a last hope the 
very force that is to be his undoing. He 
will feed on the youthful vigour and mounting 
enthusiasm of Hilda Wangel. But it is too 
late. Youth is too bountiful for old age, and 
in one final effort to attain youth's ideal, the 
wretched, frightened hypocrite perishes. Is 
there not a life tragedy here ? 

Ostrovsky' stragedy, " The Storm," — or, 
more correctly, " The Thunderstorm," — 
although thoroughly impregnated with the 
spirit of crushed and despairing Russia, and 
strikingly dependent for its dramatic effects 
on that peculiar element of unquestioning 
submission to authority, which is so much a 



John Blair, 273 

part of the Russian character and which is 
the real cause of Russian despotism, never- 
theless, proved less incomprehensible to an 
English-speaking audience than one would 
naturally have expected. The strange at- 
mosphere of the play did at times bear 
heavily on one's sense of the ridiculous, but 
there was also in evidence much universal 
human nature — half -concealed, perhaps, but 
still potently sympathetic — in the dramatist's 
character drawing. Then, too, there was a 
wealth of imagination and of suggestion 
throughout the action. Katia, the erring 
wife, was fantastically, yet truthfully, con- 
ceived. The tragic note was sounded with 
unhesitating force, and the calm brutality, 
which made possible the sad fate which 
befell Katia, was placed before one so quietly, 
yet so unmistakably, that there was no escap- 
ing the conviction that sincerity pervaded 
the drama. 

Edward Martyn's Irish drama, " The 



274 Famous Actors. 

Heather Field," made a deep impression. 
It was a play without the slightest trace of 
theatrical buncombe, of quiet, realistic action, 
and with many moments of thrilling dramatic 
power. Its dialogue was almost always 
shrewd and pointed, sometimes genuinely 
poetic ; and its psychological problem — the 
effect of a harsh, unsympathetic, and materi- 
alistic temperament on a nature exquisitely 
idealistic and imaginative, keenly sensitive to 
beauty — was of the greatest interest. The 
most notable feature of "The Heather 
Field," however, was its unusually fine char- 
acter drawing. There was considerable talk 
about the symbolism of the drama, but per- 
sonally I was not greatly impressed with any 
allegory that might have been hidden in the 
play. The action did not tempt me into 
generalisations. I found it more profitable 
to regard Carden Tyrrell's case as special 
rather than as typical, to consider his mater- 
ially worthless heather field, which he ex- 



John Blair. 275 

pected sometime to be such a source of 
profit, merely as a heather field, and not as 
a symbol of a dreamer's impractical concep- 
tion of life. 

By refusing to be led into the fascinating 
and fantastic realms of speculation regarding 
life and world conditions that Mr. Marty n's 
play undoubtedly suggested, by sacrificing 
this pleasure of dreaming, one gained from 
the drama a distinct impression of reality. 
One saw the characters as possible men and 
women living a possible life. Unvexed by 
the question, what does it all mean, one 
could study and analyse Tyrrell and his wife 
and their companions as individuals, could 
perceive their humanity and their warring 
traits of character, could fathom their motives 
and ponder on the probable outcome of the 
dramatic conflict in which they were engaged. 

In the case of an acted play, one must 
judge quickly from impressions. He has 
time to draw only the hastiest conclusions ; 



276 Famous Actors. 

he cannot weigh fact against fact, nor hunt 
for hidden meanings. In the library he may 
discover behind the printed page a wealth of 
suggestion, a whole philosophy of life, but in 
the theatre he will learn — to his surprise 
and disappointment, possibly — that his inter- 
esting theories regarding the lesson that the 
author intended to teach really have very 
little bearing on the issue. Under these con- 
ditions, if he be wise and without obstinacy, 
he will toss aside his hypothesis and become 
receptive to that which the drama as acted 
has to give. 

In "The Heather Field " I think that he 
would have found presented to him a vital 
human experience. He would have seen a 
husband and a wife temperamentally inhar- 
monious, — the man delicate, refined, poetic, 
the woman narrow, commonplace, stubborn. 
With a person who understood and sympa- 
thised with him, such a man would have been 
as a child. But he had to be led ; he would 



John Blair. 277 

not be driven. Sensitive to the slightest 
hint of ridicule, opposition aroused his obsti- 
nacy and created besides an active sense of 
injustice. In the instance illustrated in " The 
Heather Field," Tyrrell's impractical mind 
fixed on an impossible scheme of land drain- 
age. He sunk his fortune in the hopeless 
project, and when he finally realised the fail- 
ure of all his cherished ideals, his mind gave 
way under the accumulated strain. 

The heather field was not the first cause 
of his troubles, however. It was, in fact, 
only a result. The real cause was his un- 
fortunate marriage, his union with a woman 
mentally unsuited to him. Although Mr. 
Martyn weakened his case by throwing the 
fault in the face of the woman by making 
her marry Tyrrell for social position and 
without love, the incompatibility would have 
been the same had she felt for her husband 
the most sincere affection. She was abso- 
lutely incapable of catching his point of view, 



278 Famous Actors. 

and he was wholly beyond the influence of 
one who did not sympathise with him and 
understand him. The only person who thor- 
oughly comprehended Tyrrell's peculiar dis- 
position was Barry Ussher, his dearest friend, 
a practical man of affairs in every way, but 
a man, too, with imagination and with ideals. 
He knew as well as any one else the sure fail- 
ure in store for Tyrrell's crazy land-reclaiming 
projects, but he also perceived what these 
plans meant to Tyrrell, how they had become, 
as it were, a part of the very fibre of his 
nature. To tear him rudely from them would 
be to endanger his reason. Ussher hoped 
to be able, by gentle means, in time to woo 
Tyrrell from his disastrous course, and had 
he been able to deal with Tyrrell free from 
the irritating opposition of wife and neigh- 
bours, he might have been successful in his 
work of salvation. Under the circumstances, 
however, Ussher was powerless. He could 
and did check for a time the fate that was 



John Blair. 279 

rushing Tyrrell toward mental collapse, but 
he could not destroy the conditions which 
brought that fate into existence, and which 
kept it continually active. 

Tyrrell's insanity was pathetic, free from 
horror and morbidness. It was a release 
from his troubles rather than an affliction. 
His marriage became merely a dream, and 
he was again a young man, happy in his 
ideals, wandering joyously through a beauti- 
ful world hand in hand with his little brother 
Miles, translating for the child that under- 
stood him the thoughts and dreams of a 
speaking nature. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

HENRY JEWETT. 

As safe as any generalisation is the one 
that an actor is the poorest possible judge of 
a play. The reason for this is that he does 
not form his opinion of a play from the 
drama as a whole. He bases his conclu- 
sions on the part that he is going to play, 
or on the part that he thinks he would like 
to play. If that part suits him, the play is 
all right ; if it does not, the play is forthwith 
damned beyond redemption as far as he is 
concerned. Regardless of his intelligence in 
other matters, his artistic attainments, his 
native good sense, and his cultivated instinct 
for theatrical effect, the actor cannot escape 
the blandishments of a part that, in the 
280 




HENRY JEWETT 

As David McFarland in " The Greatest Thing in the 

World." 



Henry Jewett. 281 

reading, seems to him to promise unusual 
effectiveness on the stage. He is hypnotised 
by it, and immediately forgets that one good 
character does not necessarily make a great 
play. 

In the dramatisation of James Lane Allen's 
charming novel, "The Choir Invisible/' 
Henry Jewett, whose judgment under ordi- 
nary conditions is to be relied upon, saw in 
John Gray a strong character that would 
demand, in the interpretation, versatility, 
sincerity, mental poise, virility, and power. 
He pictured himself as developing from John 
Gray a master creation of the actor's art. 
The more he studied the part the better he 
liked it, — liked it so well, indeed, that he lost 
sight entirely of the drama, in which John Gray 
was the main figure. The result was the rude 
awakening of a bitter failure, for John Gray 
had his being in an impossible play. 

The great essential in the drama of psy- 
chological import is growth and development 



282 Famous Actors. 

of character. " The Choir Invisible " aimed 
to show how John Gray conquered his love 
for the forbidden woman, Jessica Falconer. 
The theme was unquestionably strong, and 
quite amenable to dramatic treatment under 
the proper conditions. But the dramatiser 
of "The Choir Invisible'' made a funda- 
mental mistake. She did not illustrate the 
mental processes by which John Gray mas- 
tered his passion. She gave the audience 
only results, which in themselves, divorced 
from the means and method of their accom- 
plishment, had absolutely no dramatic interest. 
Another striking example of the actor's 
proneness to judge a play by a part was the 
case of " Punchinello," which E. S. Willard 
produced in Boston in November, 1900, and 
which survived but four performances. In 
" Punchinello," Mr. Willard, the actor, was 
so fascinated by the cunning superficialities 
of the character of the player patriot, Andrea 
della Corona, that Mr. Willard, the manager, 



Henry Jewett. 283 

overlooked entirely the deficiencies that were 
so glaringly in evidence in the play. Mr. 
Willard, the actor, saw in this leading part 
an opportunity for histrionism of the most 
spectacular sort, a chance to masquerade in 
many characters, to portray diverse and con- 
trasting emotions, to make passionate love, 
and to sound the note of idealistic patriotism. 
He did not perceive, however, that Corona 
was only a prettily painted surface, that he 
had no soul, that he was strangely devoid of 
the slightest sympathetic quality. Nor did 
Mr. Willard learn, until it was too late to 
spare his mortification, that not a single 
character in " Punchinello " was endowed 
with life and vitality, that the drama itself 
was conspicuously commonplace in plot, and 
wretchedly weak in construction. 

"The Choir Invisible,'' as dramatised by 
Frances Hastings, in private life Mrs. Henry 
Jewett, was originally produced in Washing- 
ton, D. C, on October 13, 1899, but, after a 



284 Famous Actors. 

few weeks, performances of the work were 
discontinued. On October 3, 1900, the play 
was put on in Boston for a run, but in spite 
of the fact that many found the quiet, some- 
what sentimental atmosphere of the piece 
enjoyable, the play proved in no sense a 
possibility on the stage. The first act of the 
play passed in Mrs. Falconer's garden, where 
were introduced, as leading personages, the 
flute-playing parson, the jesting O'Bannon, 
— the nearest approach to a villain in the 
drama, — the frivolous Amy Falconer, Mrs. 
Falconer, and John Gray. The second act 
pictured the ball at General Wilkinson's 
house, the jilting of Gray by Amy, and 
a theatrical climax in Gray's chastising of 
O'Bannon. The third act revealed an in- 
geniously arranged setting of Parson Moore's 
church, where Gray vividly described his 
fight with the panther, — a battle which was 
symbolic of his struggle and victory over his 
love for Mrs. Falconer. Mrs. Falconer's 



Henry J ewe tt. 285 

garden was returned to in the last act, and 
the play ended with the parting of John 
Gray and Mrs. Falconer. 

This final scene was one of much beauty 
and pathetic power, and it was acted by Mr. 
Jewett in a manner that was noble and in- 
spiring, and at the same time delicate and 
appealing. If all the scenes between Gray 
and Mrs. Falconer had been as impressive 
and as emotionally suggestive as this single 
one, the verdict rendered on "The Choir 
Invisible " would have been wholly different. 
Mr. Allen's theme — the love of a man for a 
married woman and her love for him — was 
interesting, and thoroughly susceptible of 
strong dramatic treatment. It had the in- 
herent value of instantly suggesting various 
possibilities and diverse conclusions. Mr. 
Allen's choice for a conclusion was the con- 
ventional one, the easiest one, and the safest 
one, of having the couple separate. F. Mar- 
ion Crawford's choice, in the novel "To Lee- 



286 Famous Actors. 

ward," was to have the couple yield to their 
love, though he felt it necessary to paint this 
yielding as morally inexcusable, leaving one, 
however, with the impression that he was not 
wholly sincere in thus acting the worldly 
conventionalist. In "The Choir Invisible," 
the problem was not admitted as one over 
which any discussion were possible, an atti- 
tude which assured the drama its full meas- 
ure of praise as ever sweet, clean, and pure. 

Mr. Jewett presented a fine study of char- 
acter in his impersonation of John Gray. 
Not altogether successful in establishing the 
illusion of light-hearted gaiety in the first 
act, he became, as the emotion deepened, 
firm in his grasp of the part, and strong, 
sincere, and impressive in his exposition. 
Finely contrasted with the struggling and 
embittered John Gray of the third act was 
the John Gray, walking firmly in the light, 
as shown in the last act. Finer even than 
this contrast was the subtle difference indi- 



Henry Jewett. 287 

cated between the boyish happiness to be 
noticed in the John Gray of the first act and 
the fought-for peace of the man suggested at 
the end of the play. 

When " The Greatest Thing in the World/' 
by Harriet Ford and Beatrice DeMille, was 
produced at New Haven, Connecticut, on 
February 9, 1900, with Mrs. LeMoyne as 
star, Mr. Jewett created the character of the 
vigorously moral but thoroughly unlovely 
David McFarland. McFarland was the guar- 
dian of the younger son of Virginia Bryant, 
the character acted by Mrs. LeMoyne. He 
was in love with Mrs. Bryant, but she had 
refused to marry him. However, when the 
mother learned that McFarland, sticking 
closely to the letter of the law, without a 
thought of the higher right of mercy, pro- 
posed to prosecute her elder son for raising 
the value of a check, to save the boy, she 
told McFarland that she would become his 
wife. This sacrifice, however, served to 



288 Famous Actors. 

open the Scotchman's eyes to the smallness 
of the part that he had unconsciously been 
playing, and he changed from bigoted un- 
worthiness to generous noble - heartedness. 
It was, barring an abruptness of develop- 
ment, an unusually strong acting part, which 
Mr. Jewett, by the effectiveness of his im- 
personation, raised to the dignity of an ex- 
haustive study of character. Besides being 
a remarkably fine impersonation, — strong, 
comprehensive, and logical, — Mr. Jewett 
furnished in addition a pronounced instance 
of an actor's complete identification with his 
character. So perfect a disguise was his 
make-up, combined with his Scotch burr, 
that he was not recognised even by those 
thoroughly familiar with his appearance and 
his voice. 

During the latter part of the season of 
1900-01, while in the support of Ada 
Rehan, in Paul Kester's " Sweet Nell of 
Old Drury," Mr. Jewett, as Lord Jeffreys, 



Henry Jewett. 289 

gave a similar example of skill in cloaking 
himself with the appearance and personality 
of the part that he was portraying. The 
character of Jeffreys was by itself of no 
great moment. It was conceived in an un- 
varying vein of theatrical brutality and cru- 
elty, and the result was a Lord Jeffreys 
compared with whom the ordinary villain 
of ordinary melodrama was as a gentle cow 
mooing softly at sunset in anticipation of the 
evening milking. Mr. Jewett, however, gave 
the part a hint of a human personality, and 
he acted it with a vigour that radiated from 
a strong temperament, and with an under- 
standing that comprehended even the sug- 
gestion of a vague quality of grim humour. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

EDWARD S. WILLARD. 

I have already proved to my own satis- 
faction that I had a perfect right, if it pleased 
me, to introduce English actors into a vol- 
ume which was supposed to be devoted ex- 
clusively to American actors. Therefore, if 
any one wishes to know why I have dared to 
include so very English a gentleman as 
Edward S. Willard in my list of histrionic 
celebrities, I confidently refer him to the 
apology and explanation which will be found 
in the introduction to the article on John 
Hare. 

Mr. Willard was born in Brighton in 1853, 
and made his first appearance on the stage 
at the Theatre Royal, Weymouth, as the 
290 




EDWARD S. WILLARD 
As Tom Pinch in " Tom Pinch." 



Edward S. Willard. 291 

second officer in "The Lady of Lyons," on 
December 26, 1 869. That was literally his 
first experience as an actor, for he did not 
have even the customary trying out as an 
amateur, which falls to the lot of most stage 
aspirants. For some time the youngster 
remained on the western circuit, as the 
Englishmen call it, and then he went as 
" responsible utility" to the Theatre Royal, 
Glasgow, where he met E. A. Sothern. At 
the first rehearsal of the farce "Dundreary 
Married and Settled," Mr. Willard happened 
to be the only member of the stock company 
that was familiar with his part. Sothern was 
so pleased at this that he engaged Willard, 
giving him such roles as Captain de Boots 
in " Dundreary Married and Settled," Sir 
Edward Trenchard in " Our American 
Cousin," and Mr. Smith in " David Garrick." 
After he left Sothern, Mr. Willard returned 
to the stock companies, appearing in Ply- 
mouth, Scarborough, Belfast, Dublin, where 



292 Famotis Actors. 

he got his first " chance " as John Feme 
in " Progress ; " Birkenhead, Newcastle, 
where he played William in " Black-eyed 
Susan ; " Scarborough again, where he was 
seen as Blenkinsop in " An Unequal Match ; " 
Sunderland, Newcastle, once more, where he 
first tried Romeo, Macduff, and Iago ; and 
Bradford, where he acted such parts as Fal- 
conbridge in "King John," Wellborn in "A 
New Way to Pay Old Debts," Hardress and 
the O'Grady in "Arrah na Pogue." At 
Bradford, he made a hit as Edmund in 
"King Lear," and this success, it is said, 
he is inclined to look upon as the first of his 
long line of villains. 

On December 26, 1875, Mr. Willard made 
his first appearance in London, acting in 
the Covent Garden Alfred Highflyer in "A 
Roland for an Oliver." Subsequently he 
played Antonio to the Shylock of Charles 
Rice, and at the Crystal Palace acted Charles 
Courtley to the Dazzle of Charles Harcourt. 



Edward S. Willard. 293 

After this came another period in the prov- 
inces, to which time belong his Eugene 
Aram, his Orlando Middlemark in " A Lesson 
in Love," his Sydney Daryl in " Society," his 
Horace Holmcroft in "The New Magdalen," 
and his Robert Folliett in "The Shaugh- 
raun." Late in 1876, he played Hector 
Placide in " Led Astray," at a special en- 
gagement in Birmingham, and the following 
spring he joined the Joseph Eldred Company, 
with which he acted, at Glasgow in July, 
1877, Dubosc and Lesurques in "The Lyons 
Mail." For seven months, beginning in the 
September following, Mr. Willard was lead- 
ing man with Helen Barry, playing Macbeth, 
Claude Melnotte, Lord Clancarty, Sir Peter 
Teazle, Sir Harcourt Courtley, and Arkwright 
in "Arkwright's Wife." He was seen in 
Liverpool as Benedick, and in Sunderland as 
Charles Surface. On tour with Edward 
Baker and Lionel Brough, he acted Young 
Marlowe, as well as Frank Annesley in 



294 Famous Actors. 

"The Favourite of Fortune," and he ap- 
peared successively as Ham and Peggotty in 
"Little Em'ly." In July. 1878, he began a 
three years' engagement with William Duck 
in such parts as Charles Middlewick in " Our 
Boys," Augustus Vere in " Married in 
Haste," Lionel Leveret in "Old Soldiers," 
and Jack Dudley in "Ruth's Romance." He 
created the part of Fletcher in Byron's 
"Uncle," brought out in Dublin, and he also 
appeared in a piece by Henry Arthur Jones 
called "Elopement." 

In September, 1881, came Mr. Willard's 
engagement at the Princess's Theatre, Lon- 
don, and the first of the long line of gen- 
tlemanly villains with which his fame is 
so closely associated. Wilson Barrett was at 
the head of the company, and had just pro- 
duced " Frou Frou," with Modjeska, and 
" The Old Love and the New," with Miss 
Eastlake as Lillian and himself as John 
Stratton. 



Edward S. Willard. 295 

Mr. Willard, after a performance of this 
play, met Henry Herman, who had formerly 
been acting manager for Helen Barry. He 
suggested that Mr. Willard be given the part 
of Clifford Armytage in "The Lights o' 
London," which was to be Mr. Barrett's next 
production. Mr. Barrett, who had seen Wil- 
lard play a villain part at Hull, agreed to the 
engagement, and thus began an association 
that lasted nearly five years. As a matter 
of fact, Clifford Armytage was a poor part, 
and it may have been that the elaborate ele- 
gance of this villain's dress and manner were 
the desperate attempts of the actor to give 
some sort of distinction to a disappointing 
character. However this may have been, 
Mr. Willard's success was indisputable. 
Philip Royston in "The Romany Rye" car- 
ried Mr. Willard a little farther in reputation, 
and then came the Spider (Captain Skinner) 
in "The Silver King," easy, polished, and 
demoniac. The personality, as well as the 



296 Famous Actors. 

art, of the actor made a great impression, 
and Mr. Willard was from that moment an 
established fact in London theatricals. 

His next part was Holy Clement in " Clau- 
dian," largely an elocutionary feat. The 
King in " Hamlet/' and Sextus Tarquin in 
Bulwer Lytton's "The Household Gods," 
followed. This last was accounted one of 
the most finished of the Willard impersona- 
tions, rivalled only by his cynical Glaucias in 
" Clito," which was a triumph not only of 
acting but of make-up. As Mark Lezzard, in 
" Hoodman Blind," Mr. Willard gave a wholly 
fresh interpretation of villainy excited and 
sustained by lawless and ungovernable pas- 
sion. The desperate struggle of the doomed 
wretch with the pursuing mob was said by 
those who saw it to have been horribly real- 
istic. During his stay at the Princess's, Mr. 
Willard took part in several interesting after- 
noon performances outside of that theatre, 
playing such parts as Dunscombe Dunscombe 



Edward S. Willard. 297 

in " M. P.," Lord Ptarmigant in " Society, ,, 
King William in "Lady Clancarty," De Vas- 
seur in Miss Brunton's " Won by Honours," 
Rawdon Scudamore in "Hunted Down," in 
which Henry Irving made one of his earlier 
successes, Master Walter in "The Hunch- 
back," "Tom Pinch/' given at the Crystal 
Palace in February, 1883, the first part of a 
purely emotional kind that Willard had ever 
attempted ; Wildrake in " The Love Chase," 
and Iachimo in "Cymbeline." 

In 1886 Mr. Willard left Mr. Barrett and 
appeared at the Haymarket as James Ralston 
in "Jim the Penman," Tony Saxon in " Hard 
Hit," Geoffrey Delamayn in " Man and 
Wife." Tony "Saxon was a "new departure 
for Mr. Willard, as far' as London~was con- 
cerned, for it was an old man part, and a 
genial one at that. At matinees during this 
time Mr. Willard acted Captain Hawkesley 
in "Still Waters Run Deep," and Coranto 
in "The Amber Heart." After appearing 



298 Famous Actors. 

for a short time at the Gaiety as Gonzales, in 
" Loyal Love," Willard entered upon an 
engagement at the Olympic that brought 
forth still more studies in theatrical villainy. 
He represented successively Dick Dugdale 
in "The Pointsman," the Tiger in "The 
Ticket-of-Leave Man," Count Freund in 
"Christina," and Daniel in "To the Death." 
In June, 1889, Mr. Willard became man- 
ager of the Shaftsbury, opening with a 
revival of "Jim the Penman," and following 
that on August 29th with the production of 
Henry Arthur Jones's "The Middleman." 
" Dick Venables" had a short life, giving 
way to the successful " Judah," another 
Jones play. Mr. Willard' s first American 
tour began on November 10, 1890, at Palm- 
er's Theatre, New York, in "The Middle- 
man." After that date his visits were regular, 
and it was in this country during the season 
of 1897-98, that the actor broke down phys- 
ically, and was compelled to retire from 



Edward S. Willard. 299 

active service for nearly three years, reap- 
pearing in the harness once more in Boston, on 
November 12, 1900, as David Garrick. Dur- 
ing his American visits Mr. Willard's plays 
were "Wealth," by Henry Arthur Jones, 
"John Needham's Double," by Joseph Hat- 
ton, "A Fool's Paradise/' by Sidney Grundy, 
"The Professor's Love Story," by J. M. 
Barrie, "The Rogue's Comedy," by Jones, 
" Hamlet," first acted in Boston on October 
16, 1893, and universally counted a failure; 
"Tom Pinch," and "Punchinello," by Elwyn 
A. Barron, produced in Boston on December 
3, 1900, and withdrawn after four perform- 
ances never to be seen again. 

Judging by the frequency with which he 
appears in it, Tom Pinch is one of Mr. Wil- 
lard's favourite characterisations. The play, 
in which this Dickens creation has its being, 
is not a good one, — it is fragmentary, epi- 
sodical, incoherent. But these marring faults, 
oddly enough, do not prevent it from being 



300 Famous Actors. 

an interesting, even, at times, an absorbing 
entertainment. That, too, to one for whom 
the novel, "Martin Chuzzlewit," is unex- 
plored territory. The interest that one found 
in "Tom Pinch " was due entirely to the 
presence of Pinch, and of the ever dramatic 
Mr. Pecksniff. What the other persons in 
the play did was absolutely of no conse- 
quence, — in fact, they were mere lay figures, 
and one was content to consider them as such. 
The events recorded in the play were equally 
unimportant. They did not impress one as 
the happenings of real life ; they seemed like 
dream-stories, and again one was content. 
But with the simple, foolish, exasperatingly 
spiritless Tom Pinch, and with the marvel- 
lously well-poised and eminently self-centred 
Mr. Pecksniff, one was vitally concerned. 
They lived, — Tom Pinch because he repre- 
sented one phase of martyrdom (and all the 
world, with fine sentimentality, in theory loves 
a martyr), and Mr. Pecksniff because he was 



Edward S. Willard. 301 

so flatteringly hypocritical. There is no 
one with any sense at all who can not 
read Pecksniff at a glance. Because one can 
understand him so readily and so thoroughly, 
Pecksniff appeals mightily to the under- 
stander's self-esteem. It gratifies one ex- 
ceedingly to see this man, whom we know all 
along is a hypocrite, unmasked before the 
world. Yet the only thing that kept Peck- 
sniff from being a great man was the lack 
of a sense of humour. He took himself 
too seriously. He did not himself realise 
what a gigantic fraud he was, and therefore 
he could not believe that there was the least 
chance of any one else finding him out. 
With the faintest trace of humour in his 
make-up Pecksniff would never have com- 
mitted the blunder of believing in himself. 
He would have become too subtle for un- 
masking. He would have secured all of 
old Chuzzlewit's money ; he would have made 
himself a power in the community ; he would 



302 Famous Actors. 

have died honoured and respected, and have 
had a complimentary epitaph on his grave- 
stone. Still, Pecksniff with a sense of 
humour would not have been Pecksniff. 

The great charm of " Tom Pinch " on the 
stage was due entirely to the excellence of 
Mr. Willard's acting. Mr. Willard dodged 
with remarkable success the pitfalls of ba- 
thos and mawkishness that were everywhere 
apparent. He invested Tom Pinch with 
manliness, crowded him with sympathetic 
appeal, and never failed in the necessary 
attribute of convincing sincerity. Though 
one could scarcely realise it after submitting 
himself to the delights of Mr. Willard's im- 
personation, Tom Pinch was not a strong 
character dramatically. He was not the sort 
of man that would have inspired respect in 
real life. He was too passive, too non-resist- 
ent, and too effeminate. Fortunately, how- 
ever, Mr. Willard kept this side of Tom 
Pinch's character very much in the back- 



Edward S. Willard. 303 

ground, and he succeeded in making the part 
pathetically real. 

One of the most popular plays in the 
Willard repertory was J. M. Barrie's char- 
acteristic comedy, "The Professor's Love 
Story," which, notwithstanding the differ- 
ence, reminded one strongly, possibly because 
of a similarity in sentiment and humour, of 
the same author's " The Little Minister." 
Mr. Willard was extremely effective as the 
absent-minded, but wholly lovable, Professor 
Goodwillie. What a remarkably fine bit of 
acting was that in the first act, when he pic- 
tured the distrait professor trying so futilely 
to interest himself in his work ! With its 
wealth of detail, splendidly imagined, finely 
worked out, and always pertinent, the scene 
could scarcely have been better played than 
it was by Mr. Willard, who was as natural as 
life itself, and who, nevertheless, made sympa- 
thetically evident all the sweet fun in the 
untheatrical situation. 



304 Famous Actors. 

Although " A Rogue's Comedy " was not 
so well known as several other of his plays, 
it was as original and as unconventional a 
piece of dramatic writing as Henry Arthur 
Jones ever did. It showed less of vulgar 
cant than did many of his plays. "The 
Middleman, ,, for instance, was a strong 
drama up to the last act. The mental 
anguish of Cyrus Blenkarn, the old potter, 
over the disgrace and disappearance of 
his daughter, led astray by the son of his 
wealthy employer, was realistically por- 
trayed, and Blenkarn' s crazy joy at the 
discovery of a method of firing crockery, 
which meant the ruin of his hard-fisted, 
stony-hearted employer, was sympathetically 
reflected in the spectator. So, too, one ap- 
preciated the fundamental justice of Blen- 
karn's relentless severity in exacting the last 
drop of anguish when he had in his power 
those who oppressed him ; and one recog- 
nised also, that the only satisfactory solution 



Edward S. Willard. 305 

of the problem with which Mr. Jones was 
struggling, was the tempering of justice with 
mercy, — whole-souled, free-hearted forgive- 
ness by Blenkarn of the wrongs of the past. 
So far, Mr. Jones was honest. But how 
weakly he brought about this idealistic so- 
lution ! Without the slightest warning, and 
without any reason whatsoever, except that 
it helped Mr. Jones out of an embarrassing 
corner, in tripped the missing daughter wav- 
ing a marriage certificate. That made every- 
thing perfectly "proper," and it was " Heaven 
bless you, my children," and a quick curtain. 
"A Rogue's Comedy" proved how easily 
an ingenious playwright can compel the 
most circumspect of spectators to sympathise 
thoroughly with a villain and despise most 
heartily a virtuous young man, who is 
doing his best to earn an honest living and 
to win for his own the girl he loves. It was 
an odd state of affairs, for Bailey Prothero, 
the villain, whom one learned to admire so 



306 Famous Actors. 

much, was a first-class specimen of the wily- 
confidence man. From notoriety acquired 
by unfolding the pasts of the nobility of old 
England, — by means of information slyly 
conveyed to him by his wife, to whom, by 
the way, he was idealistically devoted, — he 
arose to the dignity of promoting companies, 
the main purpose of which was to divorce 
the public from its money. He became in 
this way vastly wealthy, climbed into society, 
publicly wedded his own wife, and for a year 
was affluence itself. Then the foredoomed 
smash came, but even then the adroit Bailey 
was in a fair way of bluffing it out, had not 
the aforesaid virtuous young man, Bailey's 
own son at that, though the young man him- 
self did not know it, crossed the adventurer's 
path with threatened exposure of Mr. Pro- 
thero's own unsavoury past. Bailey had a neat 
revenge on tap for the prying son. By declar- 
ing himself the boy's father, he could spoil 
the young fellow's love-story and cast him 



Edward S. Willard. 307 

down from the social and professional pedestal 
on which he thought himself so firmly estab- 
lished. But Bailey magnanimously did noth- 
ing of the sort. He assured the young man's 
future parents-in-law that the boy's father 
and mother were both dead, and then with a 
final " Buck up, old gal," to his doubly law- 
ful spouse, gayly and triumphantly quitted 
the scene by means of the back-stairs. And 
right sorry one was to see him thus sent 
forth, for Bailey Prothero, with all his pecca- 
dilloes, was a true sportsman and an inveter- 
ate optimist. 

In this peculiar and ever contradictory 
character, Mr. Willard' s rare sincerity was 
of inestimable value. It made Prothero a 
thoroughly human and a very lovable rogue. 
Neither Mr. Jones nor Mr. Willard forced 
upon one this immoral condition — for al- 
though perfectly harmless, delight in the 
wicked Prothero was theoretically immoral 
— by glossing over Bailey's faults. Indeed, 



308 Famous Actors. 

both were at considerable pains to set these 
weaknesses prominently forth. One liked 
Bailey because, while practising hypocrisy 
and deception, he did not pose before him- 
self as an honest man. There was absolutely 
nothing of the Pecksniff about him. His 
sense of humour was ever alert, and those 
whom he so shrewdly imposed upon were 
fully as much the victims of their own con- 
ceit, selfishness, and avarice, as they were 
of Prothero's wiles. Moreover, Bailey's last 
act, the voluntary resignation of his son, was 
one of supreme self-sacrifice. Mr. Willard's 
impersonation of this splendid part marked 
the height of his artistic career. 




LOUIS MANN 
As Franz Hochstuhl in " All on Account of Eliza." 



CHAPTER XX. 

LOUIS MANN. 

Although Louis Mann is best known by 
his Hans Nix in the frivolous musical farce, 
"The Telephone Girl," he is entitled to 
higher rank in the theatrical profession than 
that of musical comedy buffoon, or even 
German comedian. In spite of the fact that 
Mr. Mann has been content to limit his im- 
personations to a single line of characters, 
he is, nevertheless, distinctly a low comedian 
as distinguished from a trader on comic in- 
stinct. He creates, which is an entirely 
different thing from putting on a ludicrous 
facial disguise and wearing strange-looking 
clothes. That Mr. Mann habitually does 
both these latter things is true, and in addi- 
3°9 



310 Famous Actors. 

tion he juggles with the English language in 
a manner wholly indescribable ; but he acts, 
too. He projects a personality ; he gives 
an impression of individuality ; and he has 
pathetic as well as comic power. 

Born and brought up in New York City, Mr. 
Mann started forth as an actor in the strictly 
legitimate way, barn-storming through New 
England. "We had a company of only 
half a dozen," remarked Mr. Mann, "but 
that did not prevent us from inflicting 
1 Camille ' on the long-suffering public of 
such Maine towns as Houlton, Presque Isle, 
Fort Fairfield, and Caribou. We roamed 
around among the small places, and when we 
struck Calais and Eastport, we felt as if we 
were indeed entering metropolises. I played 
everything, from Hamlet down. I shall never 
forget one night in Maine, or rather the build 
ing in which we played, for the name of the 
town has long since escaped me. We acted 
in Dinsmore's barn, and the owner had to 



Louis Mann. 311 

take out the horses and cattle and place them 
in a side stall before the performance could 
be started. The boys were up in the hayloft, 
which made an admirable gallery. 

" That night the drama was 'Camille,' and 
my part was Armand. In the midst of the 
most pathetic scene Mr. Dinsmore's mule 
began to bray. The farmer was out of the 
* opera-house/ as he declared he did not want 
to see the play-acting ; and they had to send 
out for him. He came in all excited, and 
for a little while we had a two-ringed circus 
instead of a tragedy. Then he insisted that 
the animal was sick and that the actors and 
spectators must get out. His mule, he de- 
clared, was not going to suffer while the 
crowd enjoyed itself. Camille did not die 
that night, but we came near doing it before 
we got back to civilisation, for that broke up 
the show, and the manager took his scenery, 
going in one direction, while we took an- 
other, travelling over the roads in a bouncing 



312 Famous Actors. 

buckboard, building the stage wherever we 
played, and getting much experience but 
little money/' . 

Mr. Mann's first important engagement 
was with Daniel Bandmann in " Doctor Jekyll 
and Mr. Hyde," Mr. Mann acting Mr. Utter- 
son. That was in 1888. Then came " Incog.," 
with Charles Dickson, Lillian Burkhardt, and 
Clara Lipman. The eccentric professor of 
music in " The Strange Adventures of Miss 
Brown" was followed by the long runs of 
"The Girl from Paris" and "A Telephone 
Girl." On October 9, 1899, in Baltimore, 
Md., Mr. Mann was seen for the first time 
as the Frenchman in " The Girl in the Bar- 
racks." "Master and Pupil," a comedy 
adapted from the German by Sydney Rosen- 
feld, was produced at the Park Theatre, Bos- 
ton, on March 19, 1900, with Mr. Mann as 
Vollmar. During the season of 1900-01 
Mr. Mann was seen as Franz Hochstuhl in 
Leo Ditrichstein's three-act farce, "All on 



Louis Mann. 313 

Account of Eliza/' which was originally pro- 
duced in Bridgeport, Conn., on August 23, 
1900. 

A vast reservoir of humour was Louis 
Mann's Hans Nix in "A Telephone Girl," 
and no one who saw the show is likely ever 
to forget his painfully funny conversation 
over the telephone with Sing Sing prison, or 
his strenuous endeavours to find out "Vere 
are der fires ? " the last word in Mann's dia- 
logue meaning "wires." The show itself was 
bright and lively, bubbling and frivolous, with 
aot an iota of the evil lurking in it that some 
persons were at such pains to point out. 
Many of the lines were really witty, and the 
music was catchy to an extent almost dis- 
concerting. Hans Nix passed for a German, 
but in reality he was complexedly cosmopoli- 
tan. His tongue was, possibly, German, but 
his legs were Irish, and his arms and hands 
were French. When a German gesticulates 
he does it as if he had a beer-mug in one 



314 Famous Actors. 

hand. Hans Nix, on the contrary, did at 
least half his talking with his hands, and he 
was as excitable as an Italian. There was 
comparatively little pure comic instinct in this 
character creation, and a great deal of con- 
scious comedy effect. Mr. Mann always had 
a finger on the pulse of his audience, and he 
was continually experimenting with his spec- 
tators. One evidence of this was his extraor- 
dinary use of make-up. Looking at his face, 
one was instantly reminded of a pig. It was 
a carefully fostered resemblance, and Mr. 
Mann often utilised it to provoke a laugh, 
for instance, by puckering up his lips as if to 
whistle, and then suddenly beaming forth 
with a broad grin. There were traces of the 
looking-glass in Mr. Mann's work. 

" Master and Pupil " was not a success, 
but there were dramatic possibilities in the 
main theme of the play that made it worthy 
of a degree of attention. In addition, the 
character of Vollmar gave Mr. Mann his first 



Louis Mann, 315 

opportunity to prove that he was a comedian 
in the full sense of the word. The play had 
to do with Jane Anderson, a young woman 
of exceptional musical talent. This child — 
for mentally she was little more than a child 
— had all the capriciousness, all the emo- 
tional sensitiveness attendant upon a richly 
endowed artistic temperament. Life was for 
her either all laughter or all tears. She 
knew no happy medium. Love came to her 
as a revelation. It was an ecstasy, a won- 
derful sensation. Merely to love and to be 
loved was the all in all. For the time 
being, it mattered nothing to her that the 
man who had aroused this sentiment in her 
was betrothed to another woman. Child- 
ishly ignorant of life as she was, she did 
not consider consequences. She lived only 
in the present. 

In spite of herself, however, the inevitable 
conflict was thrust upon her. Should it be 
love, or should it be art ? Whatever her 



316 Famous Actors. 

choice, a real sacrifice was involved. Yet 
with her temperament she could choose but 
one way. She must cling to her art. That 
was herself. That was her life. She could 
not exist without it. Love, on the other 
hand, was beautiful to her only as an ideal. 
In all its freshness and joyousness it did, 
indeed, seem paramount. Under its influence 
her nature expanded, the world appeared 
brighter and more lovely, and her art gained 
by the broadening influence. Though she 
did not know it, she loved, not so much the 
man, as the passion he inspired. Her affec- 
tion was an attribute, not essential fibre of 
her character. Nothing would have proved 
so fatal to this love as the humdrum of 
married life. 

So near did Sydney Rosenfeld come to 
writing or adapting a really worthy play. 
Several elements entered in, however, to rob 
him of complete success, but none more prom- 
inently than his own limitations as a dramatic 



Louis Mann. 317 

author. He was not able fully to grasp the 
possibilities of his theme nor to appreciate its 
exceptional value as a means for the exposi- 
tion of character. Unfortunate, moreover, 
was his attempt to localise his action in New 
York, or anywhere else for that matter. The 
plot itself was entirely independent of locality, 
and it was distinctly disillusionising to hear 
New York references from the lips of person- 
ages who were, even after Mr. Rosenfeld had 
redressed them, strongly suggestive of frank- 
furters and beer. 

The play was carelessly put together as 
well, and at least half the characters were in 
no respect concerned in the action. Six at 
the utmost were all that were required for 
the play, as Mr. Rosenfeld imagined it. Yet 
he had twelve in his cast. This lack of 
economy was partly due to the dramatist's 
apparent doubt regarding what form his work 
would take, — whether it would turn out a 
farce or a comedy. When the farcical tend- 



3 18 Famous Actors, 

encies of the early moments of the first act 
were lost in the genuine comedy that the 
dramatic theme forced on Mr. Rosenfeld, 
perhaps against his own will, the excess bag- 
gage in the way of characters rapidly dis- 
appeared. By the time the last act was well 
under way only four personages were left. And 
on those characters the fate of the play hung. 
Robert Vollmar, Jane's music-teacher, 
whose whole heart was centred in her artistic 
future, was an exceptionally strong concep- 
tion, one in every way worthy of the comedy 
that Mr. Rosenfeld might have written with 
the material he had at hand. As one would 
naturally expect, Mr. Mann's unusual talent for 
eccentric character drawing gave the part a 
distinct personality. But he went a step farther 
than merely to individualise ; he humanised 
Vollmar. He gave him a heart, a living self, 
and he surrounded him with an atmosphere 
so charged with pathetic power that one was 
simply amazed when he remembered that the 



Louis Mann. 319 

actor who created these effects had heretofore 
been identified almost exclusively with the 
wild extravagances of farce and burlesque. 
Hans Nix, in "The Telephone Girl," was 
burlesque, — he was mainly a theatrical con- 
ception ; Hochstuhl, in " All on Account of 
Eliza," was low comedy, — he suggested a liv- 
ing possibility. And still, they were practi- 
cally the same person, for Mr. Mann is not a 
versatile actor. The player is more than a 
mere photographer of human nature, — more 
than a reproducer of conventional types, — 
he is a creator, an originator, a vivifier, an 
expounder. By means of his art and through 
the interpreting agent of his own personality, 
he illustrates human nature. The actor does 
not mimic life, but he produces in the minds 
of those that come under his influence an 
impression of life. Thus it was with Mr. 
Mann's Hochstuhl. The character was not 
even remotely a type ; it was something far 
better, — an individual. 



320 Famous Actors. 

Probably there never was a school board 
chairman in this country just like Hochstuhl, 
but the Hochstuhl shown by Louis Mann had 
reality enough, vitality enough, and rich 
humour enough to outweigh this consider- 
ation. Few of us ever expected to get from 
Mr. Mann anything funnier than his Hans 
Nix. But the Hochstuhl proved to be the 
unexpected. Funnier than Hans Nix, Hoch- 
stuhl certainly was, and at the same time 
he was far less of a pure clown than was 
Hans Nix. A Hans Nix never was seen in 
real life, but a Hochstuhl might be, — a blind 
difference, but a distinct one, nevertheless. 
Moreover, Hochstuhl wore well. He was on 
the stage the greater part of three acts, and 
not once did he suggest boredom. How r great 
praise of Mr. Mann this simple statement of 
fact is can only be appreciated by trying to 
imagine how one would feel after experienc- 
ing two hours of any other stage Dutchman. 




CHARLES F. RJCHMAN. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

CHARLES J. RICHMAN. 

Charles J. Richman was born in Chicago 
in 1870. At an early age he entered mer- 
cantile life, and subsequently studied law. 
He was always partial to theatricals, how- 
ever, and was a member of most of the 
prominent dramatic clubs of Chicago. His 
devotion to amateur acting, and the many 
demands upon his time by social engage- 
ments, worked havoc with his legal studies. 
In 1890, he determined to make acting his 
business. Going to New York alone and 
unknown, and without previous professional 
experience, he secured an engagement as 
leading man with a travelling melodramatic 
company. His first New York appearance 
321 



322 Famous Actors. 

was made with James A. Heme, Mr. Rich- 
man playing Philip Fleming, in Mr. Heme's 
drama, " Margaret Fleming/' when that play 
was produced at the Fifth Avenue Theatre. 

After that Mr. Richman acted the part of 
the Stranger in the Rosenfelds' production 
of " Hannele." This led to his engagement 
by A. M. Palmer for his stock company, and 
during the season of 1894-95 Mr. Richman 
played in "New Blood," "The New Woman," 
"Esmeralda," and supported Mrs. Langtry 
in "Gossip." In the fall of 1895 he suc- 
ceeded Maurice Barrymore as the leading 
man of the Stockwell Stock Company of San 
Francisco, and after that was engaged by 
Augustin Daly for his company. Regarding 
his connection with Mr. Daly, Mr. Richman 
said, in an interview : 

" The newspapers, not Mr. Daly, made me 
leading man of Daly's Theatre. I had been 
playing with Mrs. Langtry in s Gossip ' at 
Wallack's. This was in the spring of 1895, 



Charles J. Richman. 323 

and her manager wished to engage me for 
the next season. I told him I wanted to 
be in a new production, but on his assuring 
me that one would be made during the 
winter, I signed the contract and went off 
home to Chicago, easy in my mind for the 
summer. But with September came a brief 
word that Mrs. Langtry had changed her 
plans and was not coming to America. This 
threw me out of an engagement after all 
other openings of any worth had been filled. 
I felt pretty blue. I had played in New 
York with Annie Russell in l New Blood ' 
and ' Esmeralda/ and I did not want people 
there to forget all about me. Besides, it was 
a question of bread and butter to get some- 
thing to do. 

"And just here luck, which, I claim, plays 
a good share in an actor's advancement, 
stepped into my front dooryard. Maurice 
Barrymore had been acting during the sum- 
mer with the Stockwell Company in San 



324 Famous Actors. 

Francisco, but he was wanted to create the 
lead in 'The Heart of Maryland;' so he 
came East, and I went West to take his 
place. The first thing I played in was 
'Diplomacy/ But after all the long journey, 
I only remained in California two weeks. 
Georgia Cayvan was going to star, and the 
post of leading man was offered me. I lost 
little time in getting back to New York, only 
to be met with another crushing blow. Miss 
Cayvan had been taken to a sanitarium, and 
her tour had been abandoned. Here were 
two knockouts for me inside of as many 
months. 

" I went to Charles Frohman. ' Yes/ he 
said, 'I can place you, but not till next 
season/ But meantime I had to live. I 
haunted the agencies, and through one of 
them Mr. Daly obtained my address and 
sent for me. He had seen me act under Mr. 
Palmer's management. I went to Daly's 
and had my interview with its manager. We 



Charles J. Richrnan. 325 

finally came to terms, — of course, I was 
eager to get the opening at his theatre, but 
equally, of course, I did not care to let 
him know it. Frank Worthing was leading 
man, and I was engaged to do anything that 
came along. 

" For awhile nothing came my way. I 
was under salary, but this was poor consola- 
tion to the ambitious actor. At last, how- 
ever, Mr. Daly had a part that he must have 
regarded as suited to my personality, and 
he cast me for Bruno von Neuhof in the 
' Countess Glucki.' Worthing was not in 
the bill. And how Mr. Daly worked with 
me at rehearsals — literally worked ! He 
would take hold of me and bend my body in 
just the pose he wished me to assume with 
certain speeches, swaying me back and forth 
as if I were a reed. The first night came. 
I was the last principal to go on ; all the 
others had had their reception. I appeared, 
and there was not a hand. My first bit was 



326 Famous Actors. 

a little scene with Sidney Herbert, and there 
was applause after that, which, of course, was 
much more satisfactory to me than any 
reception would have been. The next morn- 
ing every paper in New York called me 
Daly's new leading man. 

"Mr. Daly did not like it at all. In 
fact, he did not wish to have any leading 
man. He was still hurt over John Drew's 
defection, and he did not want to give an- 
other man the power to touch him again in 
the same way. His idea was to have both 
Worthing and myself, — or any two men, for 
that matter, — casting us as he saw fit. 
1 Glucki ' ran out the season, and then we 
went on tour. Mr. Daly tried to leave me 
out of bills, but I would not submit. I told 
him I was quite willing to quit the company 
if he so desired, but as long as I was with 
him and could play the parts, I wanted them. 
Worthing, in the meanwhile, had resigned 
and gone with Maxine Elliott. In that light 



Charles J. Hickman. 327 

affair, < Number Nine/ Mr. Daly wanted to 
give the lead to Cyril Scott, but again I was 
successful in protesting. 

" We used to have the most tremendous 
arguments over the thing. Sometimes, 
though, it was all on my side, for I have 
gone into Mr. Daly's office to have my say, 
and said it, even though he kept his hands 
over his ears all the time. Still, I am pretty 
well convinced that he heard me all the same. 
And yet, in spite of all, we were good friends, 
and I had the highest regard for him. He 
was one of the three managers to whom I 
owe a big debt of gratitude for training re- 
ceived at their hands. After Mr. Daly's 
death came an offer from Klaw and Erlanger 
to star me, but there was the stumbling-block 
of a play. We could not find a suitable one. 
Finally it was suggested that some one 
should go to Charles Frohman and ask him if 
he had anything on hand that w r ould serve. 
He had not, but he sent for me. I knew 



328 Famous Actors. 

by the way he began his talk that he was 
going to ask me to do something I would 
not want to do. What he did offer me was 
the post of leading man to Annie Russell ; 
and I certainly did object to supporting any 
star. 

" ' Can't you give me anything else ? ' I 
asked. * Stick me in the middle of some 
special company, where I can have an even 
chance ? ' 

"Mr. Frohman's only reply was a smile. 
Then he said, handing me a manuscript, 
' Here, go into that room and read this 
play. It was written for John Drew, but 
I am going to use it for Annie Russell. 
Don't make any decision until you have 
read it.' 

"Well, I sat down and read the play 
through, and when I had finished I came to 
Mr. Frohman with the exclamation, ' Oh, yes, 
I'll play that part quick enough.' 

" i I thought you would,' he said. The play 



Charles J. Richman. 329 

was ' Miss Hobbs,' although at that time it 
had no name. 

" That was the beginning of my connection 
with Charles Frohman, the third manager 
who has helped me. The first was James A. 
Heme. Giving to each the special credit 
due, I should put Mr. Heme down as the 
realist, Mr. Daly as past master in teaching 
comedy of the old school, and Mr. Frohman 
as the possessor of the keenest dramatic in- 
stinct. From Mr. Heme I learned the trick 
I still employ of writing out and committing 
to memory certain lines to say to myself at 
important crises in the play, while listening to 
the person who is talking to me. For in- 
stance, in i Mrs. Dane's Defence,' when Miss 
Anglin was making her long speech of con- 
fession, I repeated to myself, 'And this is 
the woman my boy loves ! I cannot give 
him to her, and yet, if I refuse my consent, 
it will break his heart/ With these thoughts 
in mind, I kept keyed up in the story, ready 



330 Famous Actors, 

to look my cue, as well as speak it, when it 
came. 

" I am not very old, and yet it has been 
my fortune to serve under three of the man- 
agers who have written their names large in 
the history of the contemporary stage, — 
Palmer, Daly, and Charles Frohman. Mr. 
Frohman is a man who is perhaps more 
talked about and less known to the public 
than any other individual of equal promi- 
nence. As I have said, he possesses the 
keenest scent for a dramatic situation, al- 
ways making changes for the better, not for 
the mere purpose of showing that he has 
the power to do so. I remember, in i Miss 
Hobbs/ where the prompt-book called for the 
blowing of a fog-horn in the yacht scene. 
The sound was supposed to come from 
some other vessel. ' No/ Mr. Frohman said. 
'Bring your horn on the stage, and have it 
blown where the audience can see it for itself 
and know what the sound comes from.' And 



Charles J. Richman. 331 

it turned out to be one of the most effective 
bits in the act. To be sure, he and I dis- 
agreed over my make-up in 'Mrs. Dane's 
Defence/ I had a beautiful wig prepared 
which would have made me look the judge, 
but Mr. Frohman declared that he did not 
wish me to disguise myself, and I dare say 
that he was right, from his point of view." 

In the Augustin Daly production of 
"Cyrano de Bergerac," Mr. Richman played 
the title part, which, however, was cut con- 
siderably for the benefit of Roxane, acted by 
Ada Rehan. Cyrano is like Hamlet, in that, 
while it is exceedingly difficult to give a 
great performance of the character, it is also 
practically impossible for any reasonably capa- 
ble actor absolutely to fail in the part. Mr. 
Richman's was a good impersonation, espe- 
cially in the balcony scene, where he con- 
veyed restrained passion exceedingly well 
with the voice alone. Mr. Richman's Wolff 
Kingsearl, in Jerome K. Jerome's " Miss 



332 Famous Actors. 

Hobbs," was a broad and complete charac- 
terisation. It left an impression of strength, 
virility, and manliness; in short, of just the 
sort of man to overcome the prejudices of a 
dainty feminine creature like Miss Hobbs, 
who thought herself too sensible ever to fall 
in love or do such a commonplace thing as 
marrying. 

In the fall of 1900 Mr. Richman appeared 
with Annie Russell as Prince Victor of Kur- 
land in Capt. R. Marshall's "A Royal Fam- 
ily." This was followed by his impersonation 
of the judge in "Mrs. Dane's Defence," with 
the Empire Theatre Company. In the spring 
of 1901 he acted Julian Beauclerc, in " Di- 
plomacy," with the Empire Theatre Com- 
pany. His Julian was a ' well rounded 
presentation of the part, though not one 
sufficiently strong in personality to overcome 
the essential artificiality and theatricalism 
of the Sardou conception. His Julian never 
for a moment deceived one into believing 



Charles J. Richman. 333 

that it ever had an existence outside of a 
play. It was good acting, at that, — strong 
acting, indeed, if one were content to regard 
acting wholly from the pictorial side. 



THE END. 



INDEX. 



Adams, Maude, 108. 
Aide, Hamilton, 222. 
Allen, James Lane, 281, 

285. 
" All on Account of Eliza," 

Louis Mann in, 312, 313, 

3 J 9> 3 20 - 
" Ambassador," John B. 

Mason in, 65, 69-74. 
" Amber Heart," E. S. Wil- 

lard in, 297. 
Andrews, A. G., 134-136. 
Anson, G. W., 223. 
Arbuckle, Maclyn, 187. 
Arden, Edwin, 108. 
"Arkwright's Wife," E. S. 

Willard in, 293. 
"Arrah Na Pogue," E. S. 

Willard in, 292. 
"As You Like It," John 

Blair in, 256. 

Baker, Edward, 293. 
Baker, Peter, 194. 
Bancroft, Sir Squire, 220, 
221, 222. 



Bancroft, Mrs. Squire, 220, 
221, 222. 

Bandmann, Daniel, 312. 

Banks, Maude, 256. 

" Barbara Frietchie," 247. 

"Barred Out," Edwin Ar- 
den in, 113. 

Barrett, Wilson, 294, 295, 
297. 

Barrie, J. M., 299, 303. 

Barron, Elwyn A., 299. 

Barry, Helen, 293, 295. 

Barrymore, Maurice, 322- 

3 2 4- 
" Because She Loved Him 

So," Edwin Arden in, 

114. 
Bernhardt, Sarah, in. 
" Birthplace of Podgers," 

John Hare in, 219. 
Bisson, Alexander, 84. 
" Black-Eyed Susan," E. S. 

Willard in, 292. 
Blair, John, 253. 
Boucicault, Dion, 78, 8^ 

221. 



335 



336 



Index. 



" Box and Cox," John Hare 

in, 221. 
Broadhurst, George H., 187. 
" Broken Hearts," John 

Hare in, 223. 
" Brother Officers," 

Faversham, William, 

138, 142-147, 152. 
Miller, Henry, 236. 
" Brothers," John Hare in, 

224. 
Brough, Lionel, 293. 
Burkhardt, Lillian, 312. 
Byron, H. J., 220. 

" Camille," Louis Mann in, 

3 I0 > 3 11 - 
Carhart, James L., 132. 
"Carmen," John 'Blair in, 

256. 
Carter, Mrs. Leslie, 216. 
Carton, R. C, 64, 66, 68, 

75> *37- 
" Case of Rebellious Susan," 

Fritz Williams in, 84. 
" Caste," John Hare in, 220, 

221. 
Cay van, Georgia, 324. 
Chambers, Haddon, 32. 
" Charity Ball," Fritz Will- 
iams, 84. 
" Choir Invisible," Henry 

Jewett, 281-287. 
" Christian," John B. Mason 

in, 62. 
"Christina," E. S. Willard 

in, 298. 
Churchill, Winston, 39. 
" City of Pleasure," John 

Blair in, 255. 
Clapp, Henry Austin, 57-59. 



" Claudian," E. S. Willard in, 

296. 
"Clito," E. S. Willard in, 

296. 
Coghlan, Charles, 223. 
" Colinette," John Blair in, 

256. 
Collins, Wilkie, 222. 
" Coralie & Co.," Fritz Will- 
iams in, 84. 
" Countess Chiffon," John 

Blair in, 256. 
" Countess Glucki," Charles 

J. Richman in, 325, 326. 
Craigie, Mrs., 69-72. 
Crane, Wm. H., 113, 226. 
Cranfrau, Frank, 79. 
Crawford, F. Marion, 285. 
" Cymbeline," E. S. Willard 

in, 297. 
"Cyrano de Bergerac," 

Charles J. Richman in, 

33*- 

Daly, Augustin, 51, 62, 8^ 

322, 324-332. 
" David Garrick," 
Hare, John, 219. 
Willard, E. S., 299. 
"David Harum," W. H. 

Crane in, 231-234. 
DeMille, Beatrice, 287. 
Desjardin, M., 110-112. 
"Dick Venables," E. S. 

Willard in, 298. 
Dickens, Charles, 237, 243, 

312. 
" Diplomacy," 

Faversham, William, 
148-153. 

Hare, John, 225. 



Index. 



337 



Richman, Charles J., 

324, 332, 233- 
Dithmar, Edward A., 232. 
Ditrichstein, Leo, 14, 312. 
Donnelly, Thomas, 83. 
Doyle, A. Conan, 91, 92. 
" Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," 

Louis Mann in, 312. 
Drew, John, 31, 328. 
"Drifting Apart," 178. 
Dubourg, A. W., 224. 
Duck, William, 294. 
Dumas, Alexandre, 166, 173. 
" Dundreary Married and 

Settled," E. S. Willard in, 

291. 

" Eagle's Nest," Edwin Ar- 

den in, 113. 
Eastlake, Mary, 294. 
Eldred, Joseph, 293. 
44 El Gran Galeoto," John 

Blair in, 254, 256-262, 

266-268. 
Elliott, Maxine, 56, 326. 
" Elopement," E. S. Willard 

in, 294. 
44 Ensign," Maclyn Arbuckle 

in, 195. 
Eschegaray, Jose, 254, 256. 
"Esmeralda," Charles J. 

Richman in, 322, 323. 
Esmond, H. V., 43-51. 
E u s t i s, George Peabody, 

262. 

" Falcon," John Hare in, 

225. 
Faversham, William, 137. 
44 Favourite of F o r t u n e," 

E. S. Willard in, 294. 



Fechter, Charles, 167, 171, 

l 73- 

4 Fin-ma-coul," Fritz Will- 
iams in, 78. 

Fitch, Clyde, 43, 247. 

Florence, Katherine, 233. 

44 Fool's Paradise," E. S. 
Willard in, 299. 

Ford, Harriet, 287. 

Frawley, T. Daniel, 195. 

Frohman, Charles, 63, 195,. 
324,327-331. 

Frohman, Daniel, 62, 6^, 74* 

77- 
Fyles, Franklin, 113. 

44 Gadfly," Stuart Robson in,, 

154. 
44 Gay Lord Quex," 32, 23- 
Hare, John, 199-218. 
Vanbrugh, Irene, 215- 

218. 
George, Grace, 256. 
44 Ghosts," John Blair in, 256. 
Gilbert, W. S., 223. 
Gillette, William, 89, 114/ 
Gilmore, Patrick Sarsfield, 

81. 
44 Girl from Paris," Louis 

Mann in, 312. 
44 Girl in the Barracks," 

Louis Mann in, 312. 
Goodwin, N. C, 43, 64, 196. 
44 Gossip," Charles J. Rich- 
man in, 322. 
44 Governor of Kentucky," 

Edwin Arden in, 113, 114. 
44 Greatest Thing in the 

World," Henry Jewett in, 

287-288. 
44 Griffith Davenport," 178. 



338 



Index. 



Grundy, Sidney, 166, 167, 
169-17 1, 299. 

"Hamlet," 128. 

Miller, Henry, 236. 
Sothern, E. H., 13, 23- 

3 1 - 

Willard, E. S., 296, 299. 
"Hannele," Charles J. 

Richman in, 322. 
Harcourt, Charles, 292. 
" Hard Hit," E. S. Willard 

in, 297. 
Hare, John, 198. 
Harned, Virginia, 14. 
Harvey, Martin, 238. 
Hastings, Frances, 283. 
Hatton, Joseph, 299. 
Hauptmann, Gerhart, 12, 

257. 
" Heartease," Henry Miller 

in, 236. 
" Hearts of Oak," 177. 
" Heather Field," 255, 274- 

279. 
" Held by the Enemy," 90. 
Henderson, Alexander, 219. 
" Henrietta," Stuart Rob- 
son in, 164. 
" Henry V " (see u King 

Henry V."). 
Herman, Henry, 295. 
Heme, James A., 176, 241, 

322, 329. 
Hervieu, Paul, 254, 268. 
"Highest Bidder," E. H. 

Sothern in, 11. 
Hitchcock, R. and M., 231. 
Hobbes, John Oliver (see 

Mrs. Craigie). 
Holland, E. M., 87, 88. 



Hollingshead, John, 219. 

" Home Secretary," Frit2 
Williams in, 84. 

Honey, George, 221. 

"Hoodman Blind," E. S. 
Willard in, 296. 

"Household Gods," E. S. 
Willard in, 296. 

" House of Darnley," John 
Hare in, 224. 

Howard, Bronson, 226. 

" How She Loves Him," 
John Hare in, 221. 

"Hunchback," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 297. 

"Hundred Thousand 
Pounds," John Hare in, 
220. 

" Hunted Down," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 297. 

Ibsen, Henrik, 254, 256, 

257, 269-272. 
" Idler," Fritz Williams in, 

84. 
" Incog," Louis Mann in, 

312. 
" Ironmaster," John Hare in, 

225. 
Irving, Sir Henry, 51, 59, 

218, 238, 297. 

Janauschek, Madame, 256. 

Jewett, Henry, 280. 

Jewett, Mrs. Henry (see 

Frances Hastings). 
" Jilt," Fritz W r illiams in, 8^ 
" Jim the Penman," E. S. 

Willard in, 297, 298. 
" John Gabriel Borkman," 

John Blair in, 256. 



Index. 



339 



" John Needham's Double," 
E. S. Willard in, 299. 

Johnson, Dr. Samuel, 159, 
160. 

Jones, Henry Arthur, 64, 
294, 298, 299, 304, 305, 

307. 
"Judah," E. S. Willard in, 
298. 

Kahn, Florence, 255, 269, 

270. 
Keene, Thomas W., 113. 
Kendal, Mr. and Mrs., 221, 

223, 224, 225. 
Kester, Paul, 262, 288. 
"King Henry V.," Richard 

Mansfield in, 116-136. 
" King John," E. S. Willard, 

292. 
" King Lear," E. S. Willard 

in, 292. 

" Lady Clancarty," E. S. 
Willard in, 297. 

" Lady Huntworth's Experi- 
ment," John B. Mason in, 

75' 76. 

" Lady of Lyons," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 291, 293. 

" L'Aiglon," Edwin Arden 
in, 108-112. 

Langtry, Mrs. Lily, 322. 

" Lash of the Whip," Fritz 
Williams in, 84. 

" Led Astray," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 293. 

" Left at the Post," John 
Blair in, 255. 

Le Moyne, Sarah Cowell, 
287. 



" Lesson in Love," E. S. 
Willard in, 213. 

"Les Tenailles" (see 
"Ties)." 

"Liberty Hall," Henry 
Miller in, 236. 

"Lights o' London," E. S. 
Willard in, 295. 

Lipman, Clara, 312. 

"Little Don Giovanni," 
John Hare in, 220. 

"Little Em'ly," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 294. 

" Lord and Lady Algy," 

Faversham, William, 
137-142. 

Miller, Henry, 236. 

"Love Chase," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 298. 

"Loyal Love," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 297. 

"Lyons Mail," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 293. 

Lytton, Bulwer, 221, 224, 
296. 

" Macbeth," E. S. Willard in, 

292, 293. 
Macklin, William, 60. 
" Man of Business," John 

Hare in, 219. 
" Make Way for the Ladies," 

Fritz Williams in, 84. 
" Man and Wife," 
Hare, John, 222. 
Willard, E. S., 297. 
" Man from Mexico," Maclyn 

Arbuckle in, 195. 
" Man of Forty," John B. 

Mason in, 74, 75. 
Mann, Louis, 309. 



340 



Index. 



Mansfield, Richard, 116. 
" Margaret Fleming," 178. 

Richman, Charles J., 322. 
Marlowe, Julia, 256. 
" Marquise," Fritz Williams 

in, 84. 
" Married in Haste," E. S. 

Willard in, 294. 
Marshall, Capt. R., 332. 
Martyn, Edward, 255, 273, 

277. 
Mason, John B., 62. 
*' Master and Pupil," Louis 

Mann in, 312, 314-319. 
" Master Builder," 255, 269- 

272. 
Matthews, Brander, 226. 
McLean, R. D., 194. 
Meltzer, Charles Henry, 12. 
" Merchant of Venice," 

Arbuckle, Maclyn, 196, 

197. 

Goodwin, N. C. 51-61. 
Rice, Charles, 292. 
Willard, E. S., 292. 
" Middleman," E. S. Willard 

in, 298. 
Miller, Henry, 235. 
Milliken, Sandol, 229. 
Millward, Jessie, 148. 
" Minute Man," 177. 
« Miss Hobbs," Charles J. 

Richman in, 329-332. 
Modjeska, Helena, 294. 
" Money," John Hare in, 

221. 
" Money Spinner," John 

Hare in, 225. 
" Monte Cristo," James 

O'Neill in, 166, 167, 171- 

175- 



Morton, Michael, 228, 230. 
"Moths," Maclyn Arbuckle 

in, 195. 
" M. P." 

Hare, John, 221. 
Willard, E. S., 297. 
"Mrs. Dane's Defence," 

Charles J. Richman in, 

329, 331, 332. 
"Much Ado," E. S. Willard 

in, 293. 
Murray, Leigh, 219. 
Murray, Mrs. Leigh, 221. 
"Musketeer s," James 

O'Neill in, 166-171. 

" Nathan Hale," 247. 

Goodwin, N. C, 43, 

44. 
" Naval Engagement s," 

John Hare in, 219. 
Nethersole, Olga, 255, 256. 
"New Blood," Charles J. 

Richman in, 322, 323. 
"New Magdalen," E. S. 

Willard in, 293. 
" New Men and Old Acres," 

John Hare in, 224. 
" New Way to Pay Old 

Debts," E. S. Willard in, 

292. 
" New Woman," Charles J. 

Richman in, 322. 
"Nine Days' Wonder," 

John Hare in, 223. 
"Nita's First," Fritz Will- 
iams in, 83. 
" Notorious Mrs. Ebbsmith," 

John Hare in, 225. 
" Number Nine," Charles J. 

Richman in, 327. 



Index. 



341 



"Old Soldiers," E. S. Wil- 

lard in, 294. 
" Oliver Goldsmith," Stuart 

Robson in, 154-165. 
"On and Off," Fritz Will- 
iams in, 84-88. 
O'Neill, James, 166. 
" Only Way," Henry Miller 

in, 236-245. 
Ostrovsky, Alexander, 255, 

272. 
" Othello," E. S. Willard in, 

292. 
Ouida, 196. 
"Our American Cousin," 

E. S. Willard in, 291. 
" Our Boys," E. S. Willard 

in, 294. 
" Ours," John Hare in, 220. 

" Pair of Spectacles," John 

Hare in, 218, 225. 
Palmer, A. M., 322, 324, 330. 
" Peter Stuyvesant," W. H. 

Crane in, 226, 227. 
" Pinafore," Fritz Williams 

in, 81. 
Pinero, Arthur Wing, 32, 

64, 199, 200, 202, 225. 
" Play," John Hare in, 221. 
" Pointsman," E. S. Willard 

in. 298. 
Potter, Paul ML, 196. 
Prescott, Marie, 194. 
" Prisoner of Zenda," E. H. 

Sothern in, 11. 
" Private Secretary," 90. 

Gillette, William, 104, 

105. 
M Professor's Love Story," 

E. S. Willard in, 299, 303. 



" Progress," E. S. Willard in, 
292. 

"Punchinello," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 282, 283, 299. 

" Quiet Rubber," John Hare, 

22^. 
" Quo Vadis," John Blair in, 

256. 

" Raglan's Way." Edwin Ar- 

den in, 113. 
Rehan, Ada, 288, 331. 
Rehan, Arthur, 8^> 
Rice, Charles, 292. 
M Rich Man's Son," 

Crane, W. H., 228-231. 
Milliken, Sandol, 229. 
" Richard Carvel," John 

Drew in, 38-42. 
" Richard Savage," Henry 

Miller in, 236, 237, 245- 

252. 
Richman, Charles J., 321. 
Rignold, George, 135. 
Robertson, Tom, 219, 220. 
Robson, Stuart, 154. 
" Rogue's Comedy," E. S. 

Willard in, 299, 304-308. 
" Roland for an Oliver," 

E. S. Willard in, 292. 
" Romany Rye," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 295. 
" Romeo and Juliet," E. S. 

Willard in, 292. 
Rose, Edward E., 38, 39, 40, 

154, 231. 
Rosenfeld, Sydney, 312, 316, 

317. 
Ross, Charles J., 85. 



342 



Index, 



" Royal Family," Charles J. 

Richman in, 332. 
Russell, Annie, 323, 328, 332. 
" Ruth's Romance," E. S. 

Willard in, 294. 
Ryley, Madeline Lucette, 

245, 246-249. 

" Sag Harbour," James A. 

Heme in, 176-186. 
Salvini, Alexander, 167. 
Sardou, Victorien, 148-150, 

223, 332. 
Sargent, Franklin, 255. 
" School," John Hare in, 221. 
"School for Scandal," 
Hare, John, 222. 
Willard, E. S., 293. 
Scott, Cyril, 327. 
" Scrap of Paper," 
Hare, John, 223. 
Williams, Fritz, 82. 
Seawell, Mollie Elliott, 195. 
" Secret Service," 91. 

Gillette, William, 103, 

105, 106. 
"Seeing Warren," Fritz 

Williams in, 78. 
"Self and Lady," Fritz 

Williams in, 84. 
Selten, Morton, 14. 
" S e n a t o r," Maclyn Ar- 

buckle in, 195. 
" Shaughran," E. S. Willard 

in, 293. 
Shannon, EfHe, 81. 
"Sherlock Holmes," Will- 
iam Gillette in, 91-107. 
" She Stoops to Conquer," 

E. S. Willard in, 293. 
"Shore Acres," 178. 



Heme, James A., 185, 

186. 
"Silver King," E. S. Wil- 
lard in, 295. 
" Society," 

Hare, John, 220. 
Willard, E. S.,293, 2 97- 
" Song of the Sword," E. H. 

Sothern in, 13. 
Sothern, E. A., 219, 291. 
Sothern, Edward H., 11. 
" Sowing the Wind," Henry 

Miller in, 236. 
" Spartacus," Maclyn Ar- 

buckle in, 195. 
" Sprightly Romance of 

Marsac," Maclyn Ar- 

buckle in, 195. 
" Squire," John Hare in, 225. 
" Still Waters Run Deep," 

E. S. Willard in, 297. 
"Storm," 255, 272, 273. 
" Strange Adventures of 

Miss Brow n," Louis 

Mann in, 312. 
Sudermann, 257. 
"Sunken Bell," E. H. 

Sothern in, 12-23. 
" Sweet Lavender," Fritz 

Williams in, 84. 
" Sweet Nell of Old Drury," 

Henry Jewett in, 288, 289. 

" Tame Cats," John Hare in, 

221. 
Taylor, Tom, 224. 
" Telephone Girl," Louis 

Mann in, 309, 312-314, 

3 T 9> 320. 
Tennyson, Alfred, 225. 
Terry, Ellen, 52, 224. 



Index. 



343 



Thomas, Augustus, 154, 160, 

165. 

" Ticket - of • Leave M a n," 
E. S. Willard in, 298. 

" Ties," John Blair in, 254, 
262-268. 

" Tom Pinch," E. S. Willard 
in, 297, 299-303. 

Toole, J. L., 219. 

" Too Much Johnson," Will- 
iam Gillette in, 105, 106. 

Tree, Beerbohm, 166. 

Trevor, Leo, 138, 143, 145, 
146. 

" Tyranny of Tears," John 
Drew in, 32-38. 

" Uncle," E. S. Willard in, 

294. 
" Under Two Flags," Mac- 

lyn Arbuckle in, 195, 196. 
"Unequal Match," E. S. 

Willard in, 292. 

Vanbrugh, Irene, 215. 

" Vicar of Wakefield," John 

Hare in, 224. 
" Victims," John Hare in, 

224. 
Voynich, Mrs., 154. 

Wallack, James, 82, 8^- 

Warren, William, 78. 

" Wealth," E. S. Willard in, 

299. 
W eaver, H. A., Sr., 160-163. 
Weber and Fields, 84, 85. 
Westcott, Edward Noyes, 

231, 232. 



" What Dreams May Come," 
John Blair in, 256. 

"Wheels Within Wheels," 
John B. Mason, 65-68. 

" When We Were Twenty- 
one," N. C. Goodwin in, 

43-5 1 - 
" Why Smith Left Home," 

Maclyn Arbuckle in, 187- 

192. 
"Wife," Fritz Williams in, 

84. 
" Wife of Scarlii," John 

Blair in, 256. 
Willard, Edward S., 282, 

283, 290. 
Williams, Frederick, 78, 82. 
Williams, Fritz, yy. 
Wills, Freeman, 237, 240, 

242. 
Wills, W.G., 224. 
Wilton, Marie (see Mrs. 

Squire Bancroft). 
Wolff, Michael, 229. 
" Woman in Mauve," John 

Hare in, 219. 
" Won by Honours," E. S. 

Willard in, 297. 
Worthing, Frank, 325, 326. 
Wyndham, Charles, 32. 

Yates, Edmund, 221. 
Yeamans, Mrs. Annie, 191, 

192. 
Young, William, 195. 

Zangwill, Israel, 179. 
" Zorah," Edwin Arden in, 
115. 







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